


Something in the Water

by Iridessence



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Australia, CHAN NEEDS SLEEP, Felix is rich™, Hwang Hyunjin is Petty, Hwang Hyunjin is Whipped, Hwang Hyunjin is disrespekted™, Insomniac Bang Chan, Jeongin is evil, M/M, Pseudo-siren!Seungmin, Siren!jisung, Siren!minho, Siren!woojin, The Author Is A Mess, all ships other than seungjin are side ships, does it need to be here, is it important, newsflash: they aren't, not even surprised that's a tag, probably not, the author thinks they're funny, this is a mess, yes - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-26
Updated: 2019-05-14
Packaged: 2019-12-18 11:21:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 69,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18248816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iridessence/pseuds/Iridessence
Summary: When he lugs the body onto its back on the sand, he belatedly realizes that one, the young man is very much naked. And...well, he was hot. Hyunjin would’ve gone into gay panic mode if it weren’t for the fact that hot-and-naked was also passed out and probably half-drowned and was thatbloodon his neck?!, so he readies himself to do CPR. Before he can even touch hot-and-naked (Hyunjin really had to find out what his name was), the young man coughs and spews out salty water with a groan, rolling over on the sand.“S’hot…”the boy mutters.You’re hot,Hyunjin thinks.When Hwang Hyunjin rescues a boy from drowning during a vacation in Sydney with his friends, he really didn’t expect to fall for him, but feelings are a weird thing, and there must be something in the water because Hwang Hyunjin did not just fall for people. Problem is, there definitely is something in the water, and it’s out to get him. Siren!AU





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome to this hot mess, nothing much here :') please enjoy your read

Hyunjin is just surprised that he didn’t scream. Not that he normally screamed or anything, but it just was quite the disconcerting event to happen upon a body, facedown and half submerged in salty sea water and bobbing there in a very much lifeless manner. That wasn’t the reason why Hyunjin had nearly and gracelessly fallen back onto the white sand of the Australian seaside (yes, he did need to emphasize the fact that it was Australian); the real reason was because the body moved. _Moved._ Dead people were not supposed to move unless this was some kind of horror movie, and Hyunjin did not do horror movies.

When the body doesn’t move any more than that, Hyunjin gathers his senses enough to realize that if the person is still alive, there’s probably a reason why they were in the water, and Hyunjin really didn’t want to see anyone die today, so he does the first thing that comes to mind and wades into the water. It doesn’t take too long before he has to begin to swim, and he grabs hold of the body, hefting it with him as he swims to shore.

When he lugs the body onto its back on the sand, he belatedly realizes that one, the young man is very much naked. And...well, he was hot. Hyunjin would’ve gone into gay panic mode if it weren’t for the fact that hot-and-naked was also passed out and probably half-drowned and was that _blood_ on his neck?!, so he readies himself to do CPR. Before he can even touch hot-and-naked (Hyunjin really had to find out what his name was), the young man coughs and spews out salty water with a groan, rolling over on the sand. _“S’hot…”_ the boy mutters.

_You’re hot,_ Hyunjin thinks.

And he just stares dumbly, because _damn._ If that wasn’t the most angelic voice he had ever heard, his ears were liars. Hot-naked-angel-voice sits up slowly and rubs at his large, almond eyes before squinting at Hyunjin and if Hyujin wasn’t whipped by then, he definitely was now because _no one_ should look that cute when scrutinizing someone else. It just wasn’t allowed.

The young man’s eyes widen as he looks Hyunjin up and down and he gasps. _“Who are you?”_ he asks, his gaze suddenly growing cold as he scrambles to his feet and backs away from Hyunjin, who was both shocked and a little more than disappointed that hot-naked-angel voice had shied away from him almost immediately. In hindsight, he couldn’t really blame him, considering it wasn’t exactly normal to be publicly hovering over a naked _unconscious_ body, but Hyunjin had only wanted to help…

_“I am Hyunjin,”_ he responds in his limited English, heat rising to his cheeks as he realizes just how _awkward_ his voice sounds in comparison to angel-voice’s.

_“You are a human,”_ Hot-naked-angel-voice says slowly, eyeing him up and down again mistrustfully.

_“...you are too,”_ Hyunjin points out, trying to not let his eyes drift away from the young man’s face although it was easier said than done because, again, Mr. Naked was also hot. The man’s eyes widen, however, and then immediately narrow.

_“No,”_ he spits. _“I don’t know what you want with me, but I don’t want to be associated with you.”_

Hyunjin just stares blankly at him, not understanding what he was saying. It wasn’t his fault he was a tourist with a limited English vocabulary. The man huffs and turns around, wading back into the water and Hyunjin really _really_ tries to keep his eyes up. He’s left staring dumbfounded at the man’s back as hot-naked-angel-voice dives into the water.

Well. That was certainly interesting.

 

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

“I’m telling you, Lix,” Hyunjin whines. “I saw a naked boy and he was drowning and I saved him, and he goes back into the ocean but that's not the point, I think I'm in love.” And as soon as the words leave Hyunjin’s lips, he cringes, as though he can’t quite believe that those words had left his mouth. It was almost humiliating to admit it, especially since he was notorious for turning people down. It wasn’t his fault he just...didn’t find anyone interesting enough. Not that he didn’t find his friends interesting, but they were his friends and that was kind of weird to him, dating one of them. Besides, it wasn’t often that one picked up naked boys on the beach. Much less _hot_ naked boys.

Felix, their (very rich) host (and best friend, but that wasn’t as important as the fact that he was rich™), who had rented out the seaside bungalow in a gorgeous cove for their vacation glances up from his phone and cocks an eyebrow, his sunglasses falling off his brow at the small movement and toppling over his nose comically. He reaches up to push the shades back into his blonde hair and stares at Hyunjin with such a judgmental look on his face that Hyunjin can’t help but blush. Felix nearly chokes on his spit. “Holy- you really are whipped.”

Hyunjin’s face reddens even more and Felix grins evilly at him and Hyunjin decides that he’s been spending too much time with Jeongin. He coughs and sits up straighter, throwing a book at Felix who yelps and dives off the couch and onto the polished wood flooring with a thump. The sound would be enough to alert anyone’s mum senses, and it did because in no time, a head of dark, wavy hair pops out from the kitchen and Felix is quick to jerk his arm up, thumb and forefinger curled into an ‘ok’. “I’m fine, Chris!” he yells at the man who purses his lips and raises a disapproving eyebrow at them.

“I don’t care how rich you are Felicia,” he calls back dryly. “I’ll be the one having an aneurysm if you put a dent in that floor.”

“No fair! Don't blame me!” Felix whines. “Hyunjin was the one that attacked me!”

“It was in an act of self-preservation!” Hyunjin defends.

“Self-preservation my ass!” Felix yowls and Hyunjin grabs another book from the side table. Felix stares at him challengingly, a smirk playing on the corner of his lips. “Our Hyunjinnie is just in loooove,” he croons, his voice skyrocketing a few octaves. Hyunjin cringes yet again at that and halfheartedly throws the book at Felix. It’s caught easily and set aside.

Hyunjin hugs a pillow against his chest and pouts. “Never use that voice on me. Use it on...Binnie or something. Please.”

Felix’s eyes shift to something deceptively innocent and widen as he puffs out his cheeks slightly. “You don’t like it?” A pillow hits him in the face.

“No, no, Felicia, no,” Hyunjin sighs. “I don’t like it.”

Felix yelps and sets the pillow in his lap. “Only Chan can call me that!” he complains. Hyunjin shrugs, still a little salty that his so-called supportive friends were actually backstabbers. He needed new friends. Preferably in the form of hot and naked. No wait that sounded weird. Hyunjin groans and grabs another pillow from the couch, planting his face in it and just staying there like that, inhaling all the loose fibres and dust and whatnot (Chan would have complained). But he didn’t care.

“...hey, why does Hyunjin look like he’s trying to suffocate himself?”

Hyunjin’s head shoots up and he throws himself at the shorter man, who halfheartedly tries to shake him off, disgruntled, but all too easily gives up. Hyunjin whines and drapes himself over Changbin, pointing accusingly at Felix. “Felix is being mean to me.”

Changbin glances over at Felix who only smiles sweetly at him and pats the empty spot beside himself on the couch. “No, we were just talking about Hyunjin’s nonexistent love life and how he’s whipped for a naked boy that he found on the beach,” Felix counters without missing a beat, and Hyunjin takes back everything nice he’s ever said about Felix because that boy has definitely been spending too much time with Jeongin and was now the devil-incarnate.

“Hey, if he liked naked boys that he finds on the beach, we might need to call the police,” Changbin deadpans and Hyunjin gasps because how could his beloved Binnie Binnie Changbinnie betray him like that. He pulls away from the shorter man, offended. Felix’s dying-seal laughter echoes in his ears and he silently curses life for being cruel to him and giving him the most _unsupportive_ friends.

He topples back onto the unoccupied couch and whines, staring up at the ceiling. “You don’t understand, it was...weird. He didn’t seem to care about the fact that he was naked-”

“Maybe he’s just a pervert,” Changbin suggests unhelpfully.

Hyunjin glares at him. “Put a lid on it, shorty.”

“I’m your hyung!”

“You’re all dead to me.”

Felix snorts. “No need to be so salty because you have a thing for stray naked boys on the beach.”

“For the last time, I thought he was drowning! And his neck was bloody, if I might add.” Hyunjin huffs. “But anyway, where was I. It wasn’t the pervy kind of naked...he just acted like it was normal to walk around naked you know. Like he didn’t know that it wasn’t normal.”

“Since when do you ever talk about anyone like you care about people?” Felix teases, but before Hyunjin can snap at him again, he purses his lips. “So all this really happened?”

“I’m telling you it did!” Hyunjin insists. “And did I mention that he has the nicest voice…”

“Hyung, he’s going starry-eyed, someone get me a bucket I think I’m going to toss my breakfast.”

Hyunjin flips Felix the bird. “I hope you die a slow and painful death, _Lee Yongbok._ ”

_“Yah!”_

 

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

Hyunjin doesn’t know what it is that makes him roll out of the (extremely comfortable and luxurious and damn, Felix was really out here living the good life) bed, unable to sleep. He rubs his eyes and throws on an oversized grey hoodie, slipping on his sandals and padding quietly through the corridor until he’s at the door of their bungalow, staring out over the sea. 

A breeze blows over him and he shivers, not moving away from the doorway, just watching. It wasn’t like the city at all; here, he could see the stars clearly, like freckles that dusted the face of the sky. Freckles remind Hyunjin of Felix, and he absently wonders why the boy always seemed so self-conscious about his freckles. Hyunjin always found them charming.

He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, inhaling the salty air. He feels himself relax, and decides that maybe a walk by the shore wouldn’t be so bad. He pads off down the small pathway that led to the beach, his footsteps muffled by the sand. The waves lapped gently at the shore, and Hyunjin finds himself drawn to the water, the white foam licking at his sandals as he spans the shore.

It’s when he hears it; a faint but haunting melody. It was beautiful to the point where Hyunjin wonders if his ears were deceiving him. It definitely wasn’t in Korean, but it certainly wasn’t in English either. Hyunjin had never heard anything like it, a mournful, lonely cry, lilting and soft. It was bewitching, almost, and Hyunjin naturally finds himself following it.

He circles around the cove and peeks around the corner of the rocky outcrop nearing the east and his eyes widen. He’s only seen that silhouette once, but he knows it well. Perched atop a lone rock protruding from the water a small distance away from the shore is the figure of a boy, illuminated by the moonlight which casts off his brown hair and highlights the gentle slopes and delicate edges of his face. His lips move, and Hyunjin just stares, caught up in the song that transcended language itself and tugged at his heart, bringing tears to his eyes and down his cheeks.

His fingertips dig slightly into the rough rocky outcrop that he hid himself behind as he listens, watches. The darkness didn’t allow him to see much more, but when the boy’s head tilts, when the pale moonlight catches just right, Hyunjin sees a kind of melancholic frustration shining in his eyes, so vehement that Hyunjin is taken aback. He tenses when the boy’s eyes seem to meet his own for a moment, but relaxes when he looks in the other direction. If he had been caught staring, the boy certainly gave no sign.

Hyunjin decides that this is enough for the night and he turns, prepared to head off when he hears a familiar and familiarly alluring voice. _“I know you’re there.”_

He swears he short-circuited at that, his mind temporarily ceasing to function as he turns around almost robotically to meet almond shaped doe eyes. And he swallows down a grossly large lump of saliva as he finds that he can’t look away. The boy stares at him in silence for a few moments before diving gracefully off the rock and swimming towards the shore. Hyunjin is rooted to the spot, staring at him less than subtly.

When the boy pulls himself to his feet on the sand, Hyunjin realizes that he’s still practically naked and yes, still hot. Unlike before, where he had plainly been stark naked, this time there’s body jewellery hanging off his frame like lace, the thin chains and delicate jewels glimmering in the dim moonlight. But this time, it’s as though Hyunjin can’t physically look away from his eyes. They were large and beautiful and reflected the stars in the sky as though his eyes were the galaxies themselves and the sky was merely a reflection of him and yeah...maybe Hyunjin was whipped.

“You’re beautiful,” Hyunjin says in Korean, and immediately slaps a hand over his mouth, his ears reddening because he did not mean to say that. Sure he thought it, multiple times even, but after what had happened earlier that day, the boy probably thought he was a creep. Although to be fair, he wasn’t the one traipsing around in the nude, but that wasn’t really the point at the moment.

The boy’s eyes narrow again, and Hyunjin winces, wondering if he had offended him again. After a few moments of silence, however, the boy just sighs and scratches his cheek with his finger. “...thanks for earlier today,” he says after a moment’s hesitation, and Hyunjin’s eyes must have bugged out because he hadn’t expected to hear the boy talk to him in his native tongue.

“I- Oh, um, I th-thank you,” Hyunjin stammers in a decidedly un-Hyunjin-like manner, and he silently curses himself because he really can’t do anything without making a fool of himself. Could anyone really blame him though? His pulse was threatening to make his veins burst and he finally understands what Felix means when he claims that he’s having a gay-panic moment because Hyunjin is very sure that this is a gay panic moment.

To say the least, the boy doesn’t look too impressed by his efforts to articulate, and so he distracts himself by tearing his eyes away from those of the other in order to look down at his neck which had looked terribly bloody earlier. To Hyunjin’s shock, he isn’t met with scars or anything of the like, but somewhat odd looking flaps of skin on either side of his neck that should’ve looked grotesque, but somehow don’t. He finds himself staring rudely again, and only snaps out of it when the boy clears his throat.

“Could you not stare at my neck?” the boy asks bluntly and Hyunjin’s face turns crimson with embarrassment.

“I- sorry,” he mumbles, looking down.

For a few moments the boy is silent again, and Hyunjin can’t help but feel terribly uncomfortable which was also very unlike him, but he couldn’t help but feel terribly self-conscious, like he was doing everything wrong. He looks down at the white sand and can’t bring himself to look up again.

“Seungmin.”

Hyunjin’s head snaps up in surprise and he stares at the boy in confusion. He’s met with a sigh.

“My name is Seungmin,” the boy, Seungmin, states again.

“Seungmin,” Hyunjin echoes, his voice echoing through the empty cove despite the fact that the name left his lips as barely a whisper. He stares at Seungmin, the name repeating itself in his mind until he finally realizes that he should probably introduce himself. His face reddens yet again. “I’m Hyunjin.”

“I know,” Seungmin states, and Hyunjin is about to joke about stalkers, but then Seungmin purses his lips judgmentally. "You told me earlier...Hyunjin." and Hyunjin wants to cry because his name had never sounded so beautiful before. To his embarrassment, he really does end up with a few tears escaping his eyes and coursing down his face in thin rivulets. The shock in Seungmin’s eyes makes his face turn even redder, if at all possible. “Why are you crying?” Seungmin asks him, looking rather taken aback.

He’s quick to wipe his eyes, laughing softly, embarrassed. “My friends always made fun of me for crying too easily,” he says honestly, meeting Seungmin’s eyes after a moment of hesitation. “And I-” he feels himself flush down to the neck. “Your voice makes me emotional.” When he said it like that, it sounded pretty stupid, so he’s surprised when Seungmin doesn’t laugh in his face.

“Don’t get too emotional,” Seungmin states, his voice ringing clearly over the quiet expanse and sounding almost..amused? Hyunjin feels something cold against his face and just stares as Seungmin wipes the tears off his face. He feels his heart stutter and he lets out a breathless giggle.

“Yeah...yeah, I’ll try not to.”

This time, Seungmin smiles, a small, amused little thing, but Hyunjin wants to see it again. Unfortunately, as soon as he sees it, it disappears. He watches as Seungmin’s eyes dart to their side and the boy squints at the distance. “...I should go now,” he says, taking a few steps back until he’s up to his calves in the water.

Hyunjin finds himself raising his hand for the boy to wait. “Will I be able to see you again?” he asks him in a sudden bout of braveness.

Seungmin stares at him, and Hyunjin swears that the boy’s eyes seem to glow, but it’s probably just the moon. Seungmin finally bows his head in a half-nod of sorts. “Call my name if you want to see me,” he says simply before ducking under the water. Hyunjin just watches him go until he’s out of sight.

“Hyunjin? What are you doing out here so late?”

Hyunjin glances back to see Chan, a presumably empty coffee cup in one hand and a notebook tucked into the crook of his elbow. He shrugs and just offers Chan a lax smile, not daring to raise his voice lest it decimate the serene atmosphere. “..I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d go for a walk.” He yawns, tiredness suddenly flowing over him as the buzzing energy of his meeting with Seungmin faded.

“You look plenty tired now though,” Chan remarks with a fond look in his eyes. “Come on, let’s go back.” He throws an arm around Hyunjin and turns to head back to the bungalow. On the way there, he side-glances at Hyunjin, who looks somewhat dazed. “I thought I saw someone else here,” he hums. “Were you talking to someone?”

Hyunjin blinks owlishly and then just shrugs noncommittally, feeling warm inside. “You must have been seeing things, hyung,” he insists with a yawn, heading straight to his bedroom once they make it back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sirens are half bird and mermaids have fishtails. will i bend this to my convenience? yes because i am shameless. thank you for taking some time out of your day and reading~


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you all so much for the support on this actual piece of trash :O you guys are amazing!

Hyunjin wakes up with a lapful of maknae and a groan, as Jeongin had successfully winded him. He opens his eyes blearily and flashes the youngest a halfhearted glare, but when he’s met with a bright grin, his irritation doesn’t last for long because really, as much as Jeongin was a wolf in lamb’s skin, Hyunjin still had a terribly soft spot for him and would probably sell and arm and a leg and maybe his soul too for the younger. Well...maybe not his soul, but still.

“Morning, hyung, you look like death and a half,” Jeongin chirps cheerily from where he is quite literally _seated_ on top of Hyunjin while the older of the pair struggles to breathe. If this doesn’t look like an assassination attempt, then Hyunjin doesn’t know what does.

“And whose fault is that?” Hyunjin groans as Jeongin’s thighs squeeze his ribcage a little too hard and the maknae’s sweet smile becomes the epitome of all things evil.

“Chan hyung made breakfast, we’re going shopping today,” Jeongin announces cheerily.

Hyunjin slowly sits up, blinking tiredly and running his fingers through his hair, trying to shake the sleep from his mind. “Okay, okay, I’m up, now get off me,” he mumbles, and thankfully, Jeongin finds it somewhere in his (cold) heart to clamber off of Hyunjin so that he can go and wash up. He feels like seawater and sand, but as his mind drifts back to what had happened the night before, he can’t help but smile as he drags his feet on his way to the bathroom.

He emerges a changed man, towel wrapped loosely about his hips and vitality returning to his body. He quickly throws on a loose, graphic tee and a pair of ripped sinner jeans (they really weren’t that tight, and Hyunjin really doesn’t think Felix has any right to be judging his jeans). Throwing on a few accessories, he makes his way out to the table where everyone was present except for Changbin, heaven knows if the man was still sleeping.

“Morning, hyung, you don’t look like death anymore,” Jeongin greets him again, cheerily. He reaches over to pinch the youngest’s cheek, causing him to yelp and bounce (how on earth he managed to do that without breaking his tailbone is beyond Hyunjin) away from him into the next chair.

Hyunjin pouts. “Innie, give me hugs,” he demands, stealing the empty chair between them and wrapping his arms around Jeongin. Jeongin dolphin-screams bloody murder, but Hyunjin just remains stuck to him insistently until Chan emerges from the kitchen with pancakes and sets the plate down on the table with one hand while prying Hyunjin off of the fox-eyed boy with the other.

“While I appreciate the fact that there’s no one sane enough here to call the police when they hear that kind of screaming, I kind of like my ears and I don’t want to lose them just yet,” he remarks. “You guys start, I’ll go get Changbin.”

“Yes, mum,” Felix quips with a mock-sigh.

“Don’t use that tone with me, Felicia,” Chan jabs right back and heads down the corridor.

Felix laughs and stabs a few pancakes, tossing them onto his plate. “Ooh, these look good,” he exclaims with a glint in his eyes as he takes the syrup and veritably _drowns_ the poor pancakes in the sweet stuff. Hyunjin stares at the obscenity of it in thinly-veiled disgust.

“I don’t understand how you haven’t yet gotten diabetes, Lix,” he remarks. Jeongin steals a few of the pancakes for himself and does the same and Hyunjin lowers his head into his hands. “I’m living with heathens,” he wails.

“Oh, don’t be such a drama queen,” Felix huffs, forking a few pancakes onto Hyunjin’s plate. “Hurry up and eat or we’ll bless your pancakes with the _correct_ amount of syrup.”

That’s all it takes for Hyunjin to practically shove half a pancake into his mouth and chew with renewed vigour, his eyes narrowing distrustfully at Jeongin, who brandished the bottle of syrup like it was some kind of firearm. “Stay away from my breakfast. Fifty-fifty is _not_ the correct syrup to pancake ratio, thank you.”

“And you call us the heathens,” Felix sighs, rolling his eyes.

“Shut up, Felicia.”

Hyunjin does end up drizzling some syrup over his pancakes, although not the ungodly amount that both Felix and Jeongin seem to favour. He secretly thinks that this confirms his suspicions of how the two were definitely spending too much time together.

He watches as Chan somehow manages to drag Changbin out of the bedroom and he throws his arm across the  shoulders of the shorter male. “Finally, someone sane,” he sighs.

“Why did I agree to come with all of you?” Changbin asks, his voice deep and gritty, giving away the fact that he had just woke up.

“Because you love us, hyung, now have some pancakes,” Jeongin deadpans, throwing a few onto his plate before looking up at Chan with a grin. “You too, hyung. You’ve been running around all morning.” Hyunjin chuckles at how Chan doesn’t hesitate to sit down and stuff his face after that. Not that he wouldn’t anyway, but a little encouragement every now and then never hurt.

“You look really tired, Chris,” Felix suddenly brings up, “Did you not sleep again?”

When Hyunjin glances back at the dark-haired man, he sees the dark bags under Chan’s eyes and he frowns. He knows that the man had been awake in the forsaken hours of the morning just like him, but he also knows that Chan was probably awake, up and running earlier than him and probably earlier than everyone else. Sure, Chan’s insomnia was nothing new, but Hyunjin would’ve thought that it would at least slacken during their vacation.

“You can always stay back and rest, hyung,” Hyunjin offers.

“How come I don’t get that option?” Changbin complains through a mouthful of pancake.

“Ew, hyung, say it, don’t spray it,” Jeongin yelps. “And you don’t get that option because if you’re not there then Hyunjin hyung will stick to me, and I really don’t want to die of heatstroke in Australia, so instead you can be my virgin sacrifice.” Felix snorts mid-bite of his pancake and bursts into teary-eyed laughter, half-laughing, half hacking his guts out as he chokes. Hyunjin can swear he hears Jeongin whispering a _“that’s right, choke,”_ but he deliberately chooses to ignore it.

Chan breathes out a long suffering sigh and goes to pat Felix on the back. “I’m coming with,” he decides. “Otherwise someone is going to die, and I don’t want to have to go through all the trouble of hiding a body. So everyone please control your murderous tendencies”

“I always knew that brat was part of a cult,” Changbin mutters under his breath and Hyunjin ruffles his hair, finding his grumpiness amusing. He would think that no one should expect a normal breakfast with decent people while they were all shoved in a building _by themselves,_ which, in retrospect, should have already been a terrifying prospect.

With a little more struggle, an argument on who should do the dishes and a strong disagreement when Chan offered to do it, Hyunjin finds himself setting the last dried plate on a rack and then drying his hands with the towel before tossing it aside. He makes his way to the door with a grin, throwing it open and letting the sun bathe him. He’d probably complain about it being too hot later, but for now he’d enjoy it.

The cove looked breathtaking and he’s sure  that he could wake up to that sight every day without ever growing tired of it, but it brings thoughts of Seungmin to his mind again, and the sudden urge to see the boy again washes over him. It probably wasn’t a good time though, considering his friends were right there, and really, after all their banter about it yesterday, Hyunjin didn’t know if it was a good idea to overwhelm Seungmin with the presence of all of his rowdy friends.

Besides, the boy did seem to be a more solitary type. There was probably a reason why he kept to himself, and Hyunjin knew enough about courtesy to know that he should put the boy in a position where he would be uncomfortable. Especially not when Seungmin trusted him enough to meet him again. His gaze grows distant as his mind wanders. Perhaps he could meet him again during the night. Hopefully this time Chan would be sufficiently tired and wouldn’t be out walking.

He yelps and stumbles as he feels someone cannon into his back, and his arms automatically rise to support Felix’s lanky legs as one of the blonde’s arms wraps around his shoulders and the other points to the car that Felix had rented for their vacation (seriously, the boy had too many notes to spare). “If I break my back, you can’t get piggyback rides anymore, Lix!” he hollers.

“Onward!” Felix declares shamelessly, and Hyunjin huffs, carrying him to the car and opening the door before throwing him into the backseat.

“Dibs on shotgun!” Jeongin screeches as he dashes past them only to careen into the driver’s seat.

Hyunjin pulls him out of the seat and huffs. “Other side,” he tells him, poking his dimple.

Jeongin pouts. “I knew that.”

Hyunjin, being the good hyung he is, lets Jeongin take the front passenger’s seat anyway and settles with being squished in the back with Changbin and Felix. Not that he minded, since Changbin made a good pillow and Felix had the window rolled down and was currently yelling whatever song was playing on the radio in a disturbingly deep voice. Chan had landed himself with the misfortune of driving all of them, and Hyunjin would’ve felt bad if he knew how to drive, but he didn’t so he saves himself the guilt.

At the shopping centre, he just finds himself dragged around by an eager Felix who has to be constantly reminded by Chan that he wouldn’t be able to fit all the things he wanted to buy into his suitcase, to which he retorts that he’ll just buy another one.

Somewhere between Versace and Balenciaga, Hyunjin recalls that he hasn’t seen Seungmin wearing a single article of clothing excluding the body jewellery, and he wonders if he should get something for the boy. Even if Seungmin didn’t feel self-conscious being naked, Hyunjin definitely did, and he wanted to spend time with Seungmin while they were both fully clothed...or at least sufficiently clothed. His eyes narrow slightly in thought as he tries to estimate the boy’s sizes.

Seungmin was skinny and fairly tall, falling just a little short of his own height. Hyunjin figures that he could chop a centimetre off of his own sizes, and so he starts to pull some clothes from the racks, nothing too tight, since he was sure that would make the boy feel uncomfortable, especially if he was used to not wearing clothes. He frowns slightly in thought as he wonders what the boy would like. Would he even like it?

“Oi, Hyunjin, don’t tell me you’re going on a spree too, you only have one carrier!” He can hear Chan calling to him, and he grins back at the dark-haired man.

“Don’t worry about it, hyung,” he calls back as he selects a loose striped shirt with long sleeves from the pile that he had beside him. It was fairly chilly during the night, and the shirt was soft too, so he figures it would be appropriate enough. He throws in a hoodie because everyone needed a hoodie and then a pair of cargo pants. Before he knows it, he has almost his entire pile of clothes that he’s decided to buy.

And definitely not enough money to buy it all. So he does the next best thing. He stands and drapes himself over Felix. “Lixieee, we’re besties, right?”

“I’m not buying all of that for you, Hyunjin.”

Hyunjin pouts. “But Lixie, it’s important to me. Pleeeease?”

Felix glances back at him, looking unamused. “No. Do I look like your sugar daddy?”

“Well—”

“Hwang Hyunjin, one, ew, and two, I am _younger_ than you.”

Hyunjin huffs and pouts, going back to his clothes and selecting a few random items before padding over to the cashier. “Consider our beautiful relationship cancelled, Lix,” he calls loudly, attracting the curious attention of a few other customers and a groan from Chan, who was hiding himself amongst a curtain of black shirts. Hyunjin really needed to convince him to wear some other colour.

“Consider yourself cancelled, you big baby,” Felix retorts, tugging Changbin close to him and then pushing an oversized, pale pink hoodie into his arms. “Binnie hyung, get this.”

“But—”

“Okay, I’ll get it for you.”

Hyunjin openly gapes at Felix while Changbin seems at a loss for words as the boy heads over to the cashier with the hoodie as well as the armfuls of clothes he had decided to purchase. “Traitor!” he gasps. “I see how it is, doing things for your boyfriend, but not for me.”  To his surprise, both Felix and Changbin stop short at that and stare at him in disbelief, their ears matching shades of red. Hyunjin feels someone pat him on the back and he turns to see Jeongin’s too-sweet-to-not-be-evil grin on his face, like Christmas had just come early.

“Nice one, hyung,” the youngest chirps, looking all too pleased at the scene. Hyunjin feels a smirk of his own creep over his lips.

“Right, go buy your things and let’s go before they kick us out of the store,” Chan calls, already lugging Jeongin and Hyunjin out of the store with ease. Sometimes Hyunjin really needs to give the man some credit; if Jeongin had mentioned him looking like death and a half that morning, Chan definitely took the cake and Hyunjin felt a little bad for it.

“Hyung, are you sure you don’t want to go back and rest?” Hyunjin asks worriedly. “You look like you studied for finals, finished five projects and threw in a thesis paper for good measure in one night.”

Chan offers him a dry smile. “Does it really look that bad?”

“Worse,” Jeongin pipes up unhelpfully as they sit down on one of the benches just outside of the store.

Chan laughs wryly. “Gee, thanks, Innie.”

Hyunjin rests his chin on Chan’s shoulder and leans against him. “No, but hyung, you really look awful. It doesn’t look like vacation at all for you.”

“Maybe because I have to stop all of you from almost getting yourselves killed 24/7,” Chan drawls before sighing. “I’ve been inspired lately, but I can’t...get it right,” he mutters. “I’ve got so many unfinished songs in my laptop and I’ve been hearing things since we arrived here. I can’t sleep until I get it perfect.”

“Hyung—”

Hyunjin knows that reasoning with Chan when he’s in one of those moods is really just plain impossible, but it didn’t mean he wasn’t stubborn enough to try.

“No, you don’t understand,” Chan interjects before he has the chance to say anything more. “I can’t sleep. I’m exhausted, but it’s like something is keeping me awake.” He sounds almost distressed to the point where it worries Hyunjin.

“Something?” Jeongin echoes, and Hyunjin can see that he too is awfully concerned as well, enough for the seemingly ever-present smile on his face to have disappeared.

“You’ll probably think I’m crazy,” Chan dismisses and Hyunjin pokes his dimples insistently.

“Hyung, we’re all a little crazy, you’re probably the sanest one out of all of us, and that’s saying something.” He ignores the offended yelp that elicits from the elder’s lips. Hyunjin pokes him yet again. “So tell us.”

“Tell us what?” Felix asks, loaded with bags as he and Changbin leave the store and leave the staff looking rather relieved although Hyunjin doesn’t miss the few that pull out their phones to snap a few pictures of them. He chooses to ignore it although he wishes they wouldn’t because while he knows that he has a very handsome group of friends and while he and his very handsome group of friends also happen to be terribly shameless, privacy was always something that they could appreciate.

“Why Chan hyung isn’t sleeping. Like, at all.”

“Chris I keep telling you to take sleep meds,” Felix sighs, sitting down with them. “We're heading back and you're going to rest. We can go play around on the beach or something.”

Chan turns to stare at him and frowns. “Believe me, I would, but I swear that I keep hearing voices and they sing...I'm trying to get that song, but I can't and I can't fall asleep either.”

At Chan's words, Hyunjin feels himself tense slightly which earns him a curious glance from their fox-eyed youngest, but he just shrugs it off as though it had never happened. He clears his throat and stands up. “We're getting you back, hyung, you really need some rest. We've been here for a few days and if you haven't gotten any sleep...well, you're getting some sleep now,” he decides, and they collectively nod in agreement. Chan seems about to argue, but eventually nods in resigned assent.

“Yeah, maybe I am just tired…”

“Maybe,” Hyunjin echoes, although he knows that that's not the real or only reason for it. For all it was worth, he wanted to change the course of their conversation before it pressed too far into foreign territory.

He helps Felix carry his bags to the car and somehow manages to shove it all into the trunk. Piling into the back seats with Felix and Changbin, he settles himself comfortably and rolls down the window as they begin to drive. “Let's order takeout today,” he suggests over Felix's merciless caterwauling, and it's met with a resounding agreement and what looked to be like complete and utter relief on Chan's part.

As they roll back to the bungalow, Hyunjin's eyes trail over the cerulean waves that roll against the sand and he feels the sudden urge to go to the shoreline and just stare out at the broad line where the blue sky met the bluer sea. “I'm heading out,” he tells the others on a whim, and to his surprise, Jeongin falls into step with him.

“I'll come with,” the youngest announces, and Hyunjin flashes him a grin and throws an arm over his shoulders.

“I knew you'd come around and accept my undying affection,” Hyunjin exclaims dramatically, only to have the younger propel him aside with a powerful shove, causing him to stumble. He huffs and makes a dramatic show of rolling onto the warm sand. “You're so mean to me,” he whines, bouncing on the sand and beating his clenched fists against it, his face twisted into a comical, petulant expression.

“...you big baby,” Jeongin scoffs, and Hyunjin gapes at him. This was the second time today he's been called a big baby, and it was certainly unfair because anyone with a pair of eyes could see that it wasn't his fault his friends were all colossal jackasses.

Jeongin grins sweetly at him and runs off across the sand, laughing happily, and suddenly Hyunjin's indignation at all the injustice that had been done to him that day dissipates because Jeongin just has that much power in his sparkling narrow eyes and dimpled cheeks. He hops to his feet and runs after Jeongin with a grin on his own face, jumping onto the youngest's back and clinging to him.

“Yah, you have too much leg, hyung!” Jeongin complains, toppling over and sending him careening onto the sand with a yelp. He just lies there, motionless for a bit until he feels Jeongin's finger prodding at his cheek. “Did you die? Are you dead?” He rolls over onto his back and laughs, causing Jeongin to pout. “Darn, I thought I got rid of you,” the maknae huffs. Shifting, he clings to Jeongin with a wide smile.

“Takes more than that to get rid of me,” he singsongs.

“Duly noted.”

Hyunjin whines when his forehead is flicked, but he doesn't move away from Jeongin until the youngest eventually gives up and just lets him practically lie down on him.

For a few moments, silence is sustained between them, but then it's broken by the sound of footsteps pounding on the sand, causing Hyunjin to crane his neck just in time to see Felix scramble over an outcrop and launch himself off of it with a vaguely distant _“yeet!”_ before hitting the surface of the water with a splash.

“Isn't he an adult?” Hyunjin wonders aloud.

“Aren't you an adult?” Jeongin queries, cocking an eyebrow at him.

Hyunjin gasps and huffs. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Whatever you want it to,” Jeongin chirps cheerily just as Changbin moves to sit beside them, dressed in more beach-appropriate clothing, namely a pair of swim trunks, a plain t-shirt thrown over his frame and a bucket hat.

Hyunjin glances over at him and sits up, hugging him. “Innie is being mean to me,” he tells Changbin.

“Why, did you tell him about your naked boy problems?” Changbin asks, causing Hyunjin to flush down to his collarbones and Jeongin to raise an eyebrow, a devious glint in his eyes as he leans closer to the pair.

“Naked boy problems?” He echoes and Hyunjin pushes Changbin pettily, but unfortunately the man works out and he doesn't budge that easily, which made for a very unsatisfactory revenge. Changbin side-glances at Jeongin and leans closer to him as though about to divulge something top-secret.

“He claims that he rescued a hot naked boy from drowning yesterday,” Changbin stage-whispers conspiratorially. Hyunjin halfheartedly slaps the man's bicep. “And he said he's in love with him,” he adds as an afterthought, and Jeongin's smile turns absolutely _wicked_. Hyunjin yelps and rolls away from both of them.

“Nope, nope, I came here to have a good time and I'm honestly feeling so attacked right now,” he babbles, his ears crimson. “I'm being bullied so I'll go back to Chan hyung because at least he doesn't bully me, goodbye, oh, and Binnie hyung, your boyfriend is calling.” Hyunjin turns and darts back to the bungalow, his face sufficiently flushed. He still didn't know what had compelled him to say something like he was in love when really, he had only seen Seungmin twice. So maybe he was a romantic, but it didn't mean that he believed in love at first sight (or second sight) for himself!

He glances back just in time to see Felix bound out of the water and latch onto Changbin, who was a bright shade of red, while Jeongin cackled like a witch at all the newfound, juicy information he has. Hyunjin smiles slightly before running into the bungalow and hiding behind the nearest potted plant as though it would protect him from _feelings._

“Uh— Hyunjin…? Do I want to know?”

Hyunjin peeks out from between the leaves of the plant to see Chan staring at him, bemused. He sheepishly moves away from it to flop gracelessly down on the couch. “I was being bullied so I ran away,” he shamelessly confesses, sitting up a few seconds later and hugging one of the throw pillows. He tilts his head and squints at the older boy. “How are you feeling, hyung?”

“Honestly? Like fifty shades of death,” comes the response, and Hyunjin grimaces.

“Serious enough for you to pull a necrophilia joke, huh.” He laughs at the look of disgust that he receives for his troubles, but he's quick to lose the mirth, his features growing serious. “Hyung, you said you heard voices, what did it sound like?” He asks.

For a few moments, the dark-haired man stares at him, dumbfounded before sighing. “Really beautiful. I've never heard anything like it. I don't know how to describe it. It was beautiful in a...almost disturbing kind of way? Does that even make sense?” Chan looks frustrated at the fact that he couldn't adequately describe it, but Hyunjin still understands perfectly, and he has a good idea of who was behind it too.

“When did you start hearing it?” Hyunjin asks slowly.

Chan laughs dryly. “Since when did you become my therapist, Jinnie?” He jokes, but goes on to answer anyway. “Since we got here. The first night I thought I'd go and tweak one of the songs I was almost finished with, but then I heard the voice and since then it's been bugging me.”

That did make sense, considering that Hyunjin and co. had all fallen asleep from their trip, so only Chan would've heard the song. And now Hyunjin just happened to hear it too. The blood drains from his face as he wonders if he'll have to suffer sleepless nights too, but at the recollection that he had fallen asleep soon after he had returned from the beach with Chan is brought to his mind and he relaxes. Still, that didn’t mean that Chan was out of the danger zone just yet. Hyunjin knows for a fact that it’s been five days since they’ve arrived, and if Chan hasn’t slept for a single night, well...Hyunjin really doesn’t know how he managed to drive them to the shopping centre without killing all of them. For a few moments, he’s silent, wrapped up in his thoughts, but he’s pulled out by the sound of Chan’s voice.

“I sound crazy.”

“Yeah, you kinda do, hyung.”

“Thank you for your undying honesty, Jinnie.”

“No problem, hyung.”

Hyunjin stands up and pulls Chan to his feet by the arm, nearly causing the man’s notebook to topple off of the couch, but Hyunjin catches it before Chan can declare dishonour on him and his whole family and maybe his cow too (although he didn’t have a cow, but that was irrelevant). He sets the notebook safely on the coffee table and tugs Chan with him to the bedroom. “No working,” he declares. “We’re having some hardcore rest-time now.”

The older boy looks about to complain, but Hyunjin turns to face him with a deathly-serious light in his eyes. “I want cuddles, hyung.” And he knows that Chan will probably argue that he could work and give him cuddles at the same time, so he pulls the next card. “And I want attention too.”

The shorter male sighs resignedly and lets himself be dragged into the bedroom and plopped down on the mattress by Hyunjin, who promptly throws himself on top of him and cuddles him, silently thanking whatever deity had invented air conditioning. For now he’d cuddle, then he’d go find Seungmin, and hopefully get to the bottom of this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've set up a schedule to try and update twice a week, i hope it works out, and thank you for reading again :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again, thank you all so much for all the support, I'm really shocked by it because this wasn't supposed to be a serious thing at all, but I'm happy that so many people seem to be enjoying it

He escapes after Felix drags everyone to play post-supper video games, excusing himself with a mumbled reason that sounded like something along the lines of taking a shower (although he had already taken one that morning). He instead hurries into his room and grabs a set of clothes that he had bought earlier and sneaks out of the bungalow. He nearly trips over the steps in his hurry, and he glances back to make sure no one is watching him. Breathing out a sigh of relief, he hurries down the pathway that led to the beach.

The sun, albeit hanging low in the sky, was still high enough that it wasn’t quite dusk, but quite late in the evening. He hugs the clothes to his chest and runs across the sand to the eastward area near the rocky outcrop where he had spotted Seungmin the night before. He frowns, when he sees the rock in the near distance very much empty. He recalls Seungmin telling him to just call him, but Hyunjin can’t help but feel a little dumb (He can hear Felix’s annoying high-pitched voice complaining that he’s always dumb, but he ignores it).

“Uh...Seungmin..?” he calls hesitantly, his voice carried off by the evening breeze and probably drowned out by those annoying screeching gulls that vaguely reminded him of Jeongin. He waits, hiding in the shade of the rocky outcrop as the sun batters down on his frame.

“Hyunjin.”

He watches as Seungmin breaks the surface of the water nearby the outcrop where the water was deeper than the shore, droplets of water causing the jewels hanging off his slim frame to sparkle and Hyunjin’s breath catches because this boy couldn’t be real. He probably stands there staring like an idiot until Seungmin cocks an eyebrow at him and runs his fingers through his saturated hair, brushing the strands out of his face.

“Do you normally gawp at everyone you meet?” Seungmin asks, submerging himself to his chest in the water and eyeing Hyunjin dubiously.

“Eh?” Hyunjin shakes his head like a dog that had just emerged from a good swim only to stare at Seungmin again. His face flushes and he holds out the clothes to the boy. “I, uh, yes, I mean no, I mean…” He bites his lip before he makes even more of a fool of himself than he was already. “I got you clothes!” he blurts out, and Seungmin’s eyes widen in what seemed to be surprise.

“Clothes…?” Seungmin echoes, the word rolling off his tongue as though he was unfamiliar with it in general.

“Uh..yeah. You..wear them. So that you’re not...uh, not wearing them.” _Real smooth, Hwang Hyunjin._

Seungmin doesn’t look too impressed by his attempt to explain just why he had bought him clothes, but Hyunjin is beginning to garner the opinion that Seungmin generally wasn’t impressed by too many things in general. Not that that changed his opinion of the boy much, since Seungmin was still gorgeous as hell and Hyunjin would probably fly back to Korea and cry over a few pints of ice cream while watching cheesy rom-coms like he had just suffered a breakup if Seungmin decided he never wanted to see him again.

Hyunjin watches as Seungmin pulls himself up onto the land and it’s the first time that he’s _really_ gotten a good look at him in broad daylight, and Hyunjin wants to cover his face because no one had any right walking around naked and looking this good. He whines slightly out of habit and Seungmin stares at him incredulously. He feels fire in his cheeks as he pushes the clothes he had brought with him up against Seungmin’s chest. “I— Just take the clothes before I combust,” he huffs, turning his back to Seungmin. He hears a chuckle from behind him and he swears that if it wasn’t for the small cliffside that he was leaning against, he would have melted into a puddle of Hyunjin on the sand.

“Hey, you can turn around,” Seungmin calls, his voice slightly nasally but somehow still the most gorgeous thing that Hyunjin has ever had the pleasure to hear in his life. He turns around and sees Seungmin looking rather uncomfortable in a pair of shorts and a plain shirt. By the disgruntled expression in the brunette’s eyes, Hyunjin almost feels bad for making him wear clothes. His posture was tense and he looked as though Hyunjin had cut holes into a cardboard box and told him to put it on. For the first time since he had seen him. The boy looks unsure of himself.

“Is it uncomfortable?” He asks, worried, and Seungmin just shakes his head stiffly. Even someone as oblivious as Hyunjin could tell that he was lying. And Hyunjin really does feel bad. He frowns slightly. “If you don’t like it, you don’t have to wear it,” he tells him, and he would have never thought that telling someone they could walk around wearing nothing could be comforting, but when he sees Seungmin’s eyes soften at him, he reaches up and rests a hand over his heart, willing it to calm down a little because this was straying dangerously into pathetic infatuation territory.

“I’m fine,” Seungmin assures him, offering him a small smile that makes his stomach decide that it loved rollercoasters. “Thank you for getting me clothes.”

Hyunjin smiles at the boy, a bright smile that made his eyes curve and crinkle at the corners and he nods. “I have more if you don’t like these,” he tells him. “I went shopping with my friends today.”

“Oh, the loud ones?”

Hyunjin laughs. “They are loud, aren’t they?”

“Very.”

And so while the aforementioned loud friends bicker over who won their most recent Mario Kart race, Hyunjin finds himself sitting on top of the rocky outcrop overlooking the cove with Seungmin at his side, just talking. Not about anything particularly personal, just small talk about the weather, about things they liked and disliked. Sometimes Hyunjin’s hand would stray precariously close to Seungmin’s, but he’d catch himself before he ended up touching the boy.

He discovers that the boy loves to swim, although that isn’t too much of a surprise. It leads to Hyunjin telling him of his endeavours as a swim athlete when he was younger, and Seungmin would nod politely, never interrupting him and listening to him intently. Which is another quality he discovers: Seungmin, despite his bluntness, is very polite.

By the time the sun is dipping into the water on the horizon, staining the sky in vibrant oranges and reds, Hyunjin discovers that Seungmin is younger than he is, loves waking up early, loves fruit and the colour purple, and doesn’t like particularly hot weather. They share smiles and laughter together, and Hyunjin feels himself growing just that much warmer when he sees Seungmin’s almond doe-eyes crinkle and his lips stretch out to show teeth when he smiles. He feels much closer to the boy now, and he honestly couldn’t be happier. It’s been a while since he’s just sat and talked with someone like this.

“You know, you aren’t too bad,” Seungmin remarks, his voice distant as he stares out at the horizon, squinting at the sun.

“I like to think so too,” Hyunjin jokes, earning himself a jab in the ribs with Seungmin’s elbow, and it strikes him how cold Seungmin feels. Immediately, he touches the boy’s arm, worry pooling in his gaze. “You’re so cold, are you feeling sick?” he asks him.

Seungmin shakes his head firmly. “I’m fine,” he assures Hyunjin, and the sincerity in his voice makes Hyunjin want to curl up and squeal into his hands for a bit, but he doesn’t because Seungmin probably finds him weird enough already. So he drops the topic altogether, because although Seungmin was frigid, he seemed to be functioning well enough for Hyunjin to not worry about it too much.

“It’s been a while since anyone’s been here,” Seungmin remarks softly, turning away from him to stare into the distance again. Hyunjin watches him with a small frown, practically feeling the temperature of the atmosphere around them dropping, and not because of the sea breezes or the setting sun.

“Come to think of it, do you live nearby?” Hyunjin asks him, although he has a certain feeling that that’s probably the stupidest thing he’s asked Seungmin yet. And when he sees the look of complete and utter disappointment on Seungmin’s face, that’s enough confirmation.

“Yeah, I live here.” Seungmin swings his legs over the edge of the outcrop and Hyunjin purses his lips. Seungmin turns to stare at him again and points directly down into the water beneath them. “Down there.” And Hyunjin, despite knowing that he shouldn’t be so skeptical of the response, dumbly looks down, not understanding what Seungmin meant. Seungmin frowns. “I would’ve thought you’d have figured it out by now.”

“Figured what out?”

Seungmin points to the flaps of skin that lined either side of his neck and cocks an eyebrow at him, and Hyunjin again wants to whine because Seungmin had no right to look that good when blatantly judging someone. But he did. And Hyunjin was very much affected by it. “I’m a siren.”

After Hyunjin doesn’t say anything for a good half a minute, Seungmin raises a hand and slaps the back of his head with a sigh causing him to yelp and grab his head defensively and also silently thank whatever deity was out there that Seungmin had touched him and _wow, Hwang Hyunjin, you really are pitiful._ He pouts at Seungmin who raises an eyebrow at him. “Just making sure you didn’t go catatonic on me,” Seungmin drawls.

“Wait, so you’re really…?” Hyunjin drifts off, his voice disappearing.

“Yes, Hyunjin. Why else did you cry when all I did was say your name? Why do you think you’re obsessed with me? Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about, I notice the way you stare at me.” And Hyunjin sees that same frustration that he had seen the night before shining in Seungmin’s eyes. He decides that he doesn’t like it at all.

Hyunjin just finds himself staring dumbly at Seungmin. “So then what were you— that time yesterday..”

“I..heard that there were going to be people here. So I went to investigate and my gills got clogged with sand. I didn’t notice and nearly drowned when I got to deep water, so I tried to swim back to shore and I must have passed out.” Seungmin pulls his knees to his chest and frowns. He glances over at Hyunjin. “..so I guess I owe you one for saving me.” He sounds almost bitter, and it surprises Hyunjin until he recalls something.

“Wait, so are you the reason why Chan hyung isn’t sleeping?”

The surprise that shines in Seungmin’s eyes leads Hyunjin to discredit his theory. “I’m not— I can’t do that kind of thing,” Seungmin immediately denies. “What makes you think it’s me?”

“Because Chan hyung said that he heard a voice the night we arrived here, and since then it’s been bugging him and he can’t sleep. It’s been five days and he hasn’t gotten a wink of sleep and honestly as annoying as his nagging mum-friend tendencies can get, I’m worried about him,” Hyunjin finds himself rambling.

Seungmin’s brow furrows and he stands up. Hyunjin is taken aback by how intimidating the boy suddenly appears to be. The setting sun shines on one side of his face, which casts the other side in dark shadow, and his expression suddenly becomes cold enough that Hyunjin finds himself naturally shifting away from him. “...thank you for spending time with me,” Seungmin states, but even the courteous words sound distant. Hyunjin watches, stupefied, as Seungmin pulls off the clothes that he had been given and then dives off of the ledge, hitting the water with nary a splash.

Hyunjin is left shivering and wondering why he was shivering, but the encroaching sensation that he didn’t want to be up here alone crawls over his skin, so he scrambles to his feet and leaves the clothes on the outcrop (somewhere in the recesses of his mind he hopes that Seungmin will find them and keep them) before running back to the bungalow as though hell was at his heels.

When he finally does stumble through the doorway of the bungalow, he’s met with four pairs of wide eyes, and Felix is the first one to jump to his feet, abandoning his video game controller and running over to Hyunjin’s side. “Jinnie, what happened?” he asks him, worry rolling through his voice like the waves that beat against the sand behind Hyunjin. “Why are you crying?”

Only then does Hyunjin realize that oh, he really _is_ crying, and if he were to be perfectly honest with himself, he wasn’t sure why either. He reaches up to touch the hot tears that stream down his cheeks. Maybe he was overwhelmed. Maybe he was frightened. Maybe he was upset that Seungmin had left so abruptly. But that couldn’t be the reason, since the boy wasn’t obligated to spend time with him anyway. He wasn’t sure why he was crying, and in that moment, he couldn’t help but feel pathetic.

“Hey, Jinnie, it’s okay.” He hears Changbin’s slightly gruff voice soothing him as he’s led over to the couch to sit down. “Just relax. Breathe.” He sniffles and buries his face in Felix’s shirt and the younger just wraps an arm snugly around him.

Chan proffers a cup of water to him and rubs his arm.  “Jinnie, what’s wrong?” he asks him, and Hyunjin looks up only for his eyes to land on the bags beneath Chan’s and he bursts into tears again, this time feeling guilty. He had meant to solve the issue, but it seemed that he had only made things worse, and maybe he did worry about his friends more than he let on.

“I...S-Seung—” Hyunjin wipes his eyes and takes the water, sipping at it gratefully.

“Seung?” Jeongin brings up again as soon as his cheeks aren’t quite so blotchy and he looks well enough to start talking again.

“It...it’s nothing,” Hyunjin dismisses quietly, and at that moment, everyone knew he was lying.

Chan pats his shoulder. “If you don’t feel up to telling us, then you don’t have to,” he assures him. “Why don’t we just—”

Before he can say anything more, Jeongin practically hops onto Hyunjin’s lap and wraps his arms around him, and Hyunjin can’t help but laugh slightly at that because as evil as Jeongin was, he was also the kindest soul on the planet, and Hyunjin had a terribly, _terribly_ soft spot for him. Felix chuckles and retracts his arm from around Hyunjin’s shoulders so that Jeongin could properly cuddle him. “Looks like the maknae’s got it covered, Chris.”

“Looks like it,” Chan agrees fondly. “Now where were we...oh, yes, I think I said I’d _destroy_ you in the next round?”

Felix’s eyes take on a hint of challenge and he dives onto the rug, grabbing his controller. “Fight me, Christopher,” he growls, and Chan takes the other controller with a smirk.

“I can beat you sleep-deprived, I can beat you sleeping. You’re going _down_ , Felix.”

And just like that, Hyunjin watches as the two of them go at each other’s throats in the form of Mario Kart. He’s learned from experience that Mario Kart was serious business, so he doesn’t dare interfere with the two, instead settling for wrapping his arms around Jeongin and throwing a long leg over him for good measure, sufficiently trapping him.

 

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

That night, Hyunjin tries to sleep, insisting on cuddling with Changbin this time because he knows that the man loves cuddles the most, and in no time at all they’re both tangled up with each other, and Changbin is gone, snoring. Hyunjin just stays there for an hour or two, absently playing with the man's hair as he slept, but eventually groans in frustration when he finds that he can't sleep.

With more delicacy than needed, he extricates himself from Changbin and instead places the man's Munchlax plush in his arms, watching with a slight giggle as Changbin immediately hugs it. He tries to slip off the bed, but ends up tripping on the comforter and tugging it with him as he tumbles to the floor with a thump and _ow._ He glances back at Changbin, worried that he may have woken him up, but the shorter boy only stirs slightly and curls in on himself.

Hyunjin stands up and covers him with the blanket before quietly padding out, nearly running into the doorpost. He doesn't, but he does stub his little toe on the corner of it and he nearly yelps, but he muffled his curses to the universe with his fist because he really didn't want to wake anyone up. Tears well up in his eyes and he swears that his toe is either broken or fell off and _no,_ he's not being dramatic because he swears his toe really _is_ dislodged from his foot.

When he steps into the living room area, he finds Chan on one of the sofas, the dimmed down light of his laptop illuminating his face. He sighs and plops himself down beside the man, startling him. Chan pulls off his headphones and lets them hang around his neck, eyeing Hyunjin with a frown. “Shouldn't you be sleeping?”

“Shouldn't you?” Hyunjin counters, although he's aware that Chan can't, and this is the fifth night. He sighs and rests his head against Chan's shoulder, peeking at the screen of his laptop to see him wrangling with a few demos. “Can I listen?” He asks, although it was rare that the man allowed anyone that wasn't Changbin to listen to his compositions when they were incomplete.

“Sure,” Chan responds, this time with little hesitation, and Hyunjin has to pause and stare at the man as though he had grown a second head and maybe turned into a kangaroo while he was at it. Honestly, both seemed very much possible, so Hyunjin pokes Chan just to assure himself that it really was Chan and not a kangaroo posing as Chan.

“Who are you and what have you done to my Chan hyung?” Hyunjin gasps with far too much enthusiasm than was appropriate for so late in the night. He’s met with an utterly disappointed look on the man’s face and he pouts. “I’m joking, hyung. But you can’t blame me, you literally never let anyone listen to your stuff unless it’s perfect.”

“It’s not a composition. It’s literally 4’33” 2.0,” Chan snorts. “But longer now that I’ve deleted everything.”

“Not all of us are music nerds like you, hyung,” Hyunjin huffs, poking the elder’s dimple repeatedly.

Chan raises an eyebrow. “4’33” is what I wish I’d get to hear from all of you,” he remarks before grinning as though he had just made a funny joke. Now it’s Hyunjin’s turn to look unimpressed.

“4’33” is how tall you wish you were,” he pokes back, earning himself a gawking Chan that sounded suspiciously like he was choking.

The man slaps his laptop shut and sets it aside. “That’s it, you are now my least favourite dongsaeng,” he announces with an air of finality.

Hyunjin pouts and clings to him. “You love me.”

“...”

“You know you do.”  

“...unfortunately.”

Hyunjin grins because Chan is finally smiling despite their banter and he just keeps his arms around the man, his cheek squished to Chan’s shoulder as he stares out at the sea through the large glass doors. “Do you hear the voice now?” he asks absently.

“No,” Chan responds. “I heard it last night though. Normally I hear it around this time.” He sighs. “I seriously can’t get it out of my head. And honestly, I’m not sure if I want to.” Hyunjin frowns at that, staring out at the dark waves that seemed oddly malevolent for a cove.

 

_I’m a siren._

_Why else did you cry when all I did was say your name?_

_Why do you think you’re obsessed with me?_

 

Hyunjin closes his eyes. “Maybe it’s something in the water that’s making everything weird,” he jokes, but there’s an undeniable sensation of unease that falls over them that he can’t seem to diffuse.

“Maybe,” Chan responds with false-humour, turning to watch the waves with him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you again for supporting and taking the time out of your day to read, I'll see you again next chapter ^^
> 
> also, if you know what 4'33" is, I love you :)))


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> o.O thank you guys so much for 100+ kudos ;-; this was just something started for fun, but i'm so happy you guys enjoy it~ and thank you for your comments too, it really means a lot that you took that time to write something down even though you didn't have to, you're all amazing <3

Hyunjin ends up falling asleep against Chan, and doesn’t wake up until he hits the floor with a painful sounding thump. He groans and opens his eyes to see Felix leering down at him. He kicks the boy feebly and whines, grabbing a pillow from the couch and throwing it at Felix. “Get your own couch,” he grumbles. “You’re rich enough for that, aren’t you?”

“I wanted this one,” Felix insists. “Besides, you looked way too peaceful. That’s not allowed.” 

“Remind me why I’m your friend again?”

“Because I’m kind, helpful, handsome, talented, and rich?”

Hyunjin sits up on the floor. “The first four, maybe not, the last, definitely.” 

He laughs as the same pillow that he had hefted at Felix is thrown back at him along with a few spiteful mutters of “ungrateful, two-faced llama” and “I knew you only liked me for my money”.

“What can I say?” Hyunjin hums, taking the pillow and settling back down on the couch, sufficiently awake. “I like my boys big where it counts.” He lets a pregnant pause descend as Felix cocks an eyebrow at him. “Their wallets,” Hyunjin quips before bursting into obnoxious laughter. 

“This is why we can’t have nice things,” Changbin remarks wryly as he steps out into the living room, still clinging onto his Munchlax and rubbing his eyes. 

Felix glances back at him and Hyunjin doesn’t miss how he stops short, nor how his eyes sparkle for the briefest of moments before he snorts and directs an accusing finger at him. “Because this idiot can’t get it into his head that I’m not his sugar daddy? Yeah, you’re right, this is why we can’t have nice things.” 

Changbin just looks revolted at Felix’s words. “I just woke up, Lix, I don’t need anyone talking about sugar daddies. Hell freeze over and lightning strike me dead if you ever become one.” His words are mumbled, and he honestly still looks half-asleep with his eyes squinted at them and his nose scrunched slightly as he has to listen to this stupidity so early in the day.

Hyunjin lets out another bark of laughter and grins at Changbin. “Better write your will, Binnie hyung, he’s already yours,” he singsongs, causing both Felix and Changbin to choke on their spit and turn on him, fire in their eyes. Hyunjin decides that, if he dies today, the looks on their faces will have been worth it. However, his saving grace materializes before either of the two have the chance to kill him or tickle him (or kill him by tickling him).

“Hyungs, will you please  _ shut up _ about sugar daddies?” Jeongin screeches, his head popping out from his room. 

Silence descends on all of them as they’re met with a genuinely irritated stare from their youngest, and with his narrow eyes piercing them all, it’s more intimidating than Hyunjin would like to admit. He chuckles sheepishly and has the decency to look somewhat regretful, but before he has a chance to say anything, a disruptive thump and a clatter resounds from the kitchen and he frowns, hopping to his feet.

However, Jeongin is faster, and darts from his room to the kitchen, gasping when he’s inside. Hyunjin hurries after him, only to see Jeongin pulling Chan’s upper body from where he lies unconscious on the tiled floor into his arms. The spatula that had been in Chan’s hand is left on the floor, and Hyunjin picks it up, setting it on the counter beside the plate of grilled cheese sandwiches before shutting off the stove where another one lies cooking on a skillet. 

“Chris!” Hyunjin glances back to see Felix hurry forward and lift the man out of Jeongin’s arms, wasting no time in moving him to the couch and laying him down. 

Hyunjin glances back at Jeongin, who stares after him with wide, scared eyes. He immediately helps Jeongin back to his feet and keeps an arm around him. “Chan hyung’ll be fine, Innie,” he assures slowly, but at this rate, he really isn’t sure. He knows for a fact that Chan had likely passed out from exhaustion, and as twisted as it was, he was glad that the man was finally getting some kind of rest. 

Hyunjin sits Jeongin down on the other couch before moving over to Chan and urging Felix away before checking his heartbeat and pulse and for injuries on his head. It hadn’t exactly sounded like a light fall. He frowns. “He must just be exhausted,” he states after checking him over.

“Should I call an ambulance?” Felix asks, already lobbing his phone from his pocket into his hand. 

Hyunjin shakes his head. “No...no, he’ll be fine,” he tells him, his gaze serious. “Just let him rest.” Felix nods in understanding. Hyunjin scoots over to Jeongin, whose blank stare understandably worries him. He wraps his arms around the youngest, and Jeongin just leans into him, the faintest tremors running through his body. Hyunjin understands that he must be frightened, with the oldest person in their little friend group suddenly passing out.

“...I’ll go put the food in the fridge,” Changbin suddenly announces, taking hold on the situation. “If anyone’s hungry, then that’s where it’ll be.” He glances over at Chan, and Hyunjin sees the worry in all their eyes mirrored in his. Changbin glances over at Felix. “Lix, keep an eye on him.” 

Felix nods and settles himself down on the floor beside the couch, all mirth gone from his face. 

And suddenly Hyunjin feels angry. Angry that his friend had to suffer and the one person that could give him answers didn’t seem to want to face him. He feels tears of frustration pricking his eyes, but he refuses to let them fall because that would probably only scare Jeongin more. Instead, he rubs the boys arm firmly. “He’ll be fine,” he repeats. “He’ll be fine.” 

Eventually, he manages to coax Jeongin to go wash up and get ready for the day, and when he does, he turns to look at Felix. “Lix, I’m going to take a walk,” he announces. “I’ll be back in a bit.” 

He runs his fingers through his hair to tame it a little from the bedhead that he hadn’t bothered to deal with before heading to the door. He stares outside, at where the sea met the sky, and his eyes narrow. He slips on a pair of sandals and strides out, his brow creased in obvious displeasure that he just couldn’t wipe off his face no matter how hard he tried.

He hurries across the sand until he reaches the rocky outcrop again, and he stands in the wheat-gold light of the morning sun, eyes darting around for a moment before lowering to where the water was just slightly darker than the rest of the cove. “Seungmin!” he calls out, his voice ricocheting off the misshapen rocks. He’s met with silence and that somehow frustrates him even more. “Seungmin!”

“Enough! Be quiet, I’m here!” Hyunjin hears the boy’s voice before he even sees him clearly, the brunette emerging in a splash of water and looking unquestionably angry and Hyunjin stops short for a brief moment because how the  _ hell  _ did he still look cute when upset? He shakes the thought out of his head and jerks his thumb back at the bungalow.

“My friend just fainted from exhaustion, and I want answers because you clearly have them,” he bluntly states. His attitude must have taken Seungmin aback because the boy just stares at him with slightly wide eyes for a good few seconds. His frown deepens. 

Seungmin finally moves before Hyunjin has the chance to poke him or tug his ear or something to assure himself that he hadn’t turned into a statue. The boy submerges himself to the neck and stares up at Hyunjin without flinching. “I’m telling you, it isn’t me. I can’t do that.”

“Maybe it isn’t you, but you have to know who it is,” Hyunjin tries. “Voices. If you’re really a siren, then it means that you should at least know what’s going on.” 

This time Seungmin flinches. “I don’t.” 

Hyunjin stares at him blankly.

Seungmin sighs and pulls himself onto a crag on the nearby rock and stares at Hyunjin. “I really don't,” he repeats slowly, tentatively. “All I can do is cause infatuation. That's all.” 

Hyunjin frowns and looks down at the sand. “..what you've been doing with me?” He asks softly, suddenly feeling quite self conscious, even if Seungmin was the naked one. The boy seems caught off guard by his query and for a few moments there's silence. 

“No, I haven't,” Seungmin mutters. “If I did it intentionally, you'd be much worse. But how you are now still surprises me.” He stares at Hyunjin and Hyunjin swears he can see something almost like puzzlement in the young man's eyes. “You're acting infatuated with me, and I'm not doing anything.” 

Hyunjin laughs brittlely and peers up at Seungmin for a brief moment before letting his gaze drop to the sand again. “Wanna hear something funny?” He asks, but keeps talking before Seungmin can either give assent or stop him. “I've been attracted to you before you even said anything. When I got you out of the water, I thought you were hot.” His ears redden at his own words. “But you're more than that. You're cute, even when you're angry, and you're nice even though you're blunt, and you're really,  _ really  _ beautiful. You're a good conversationalist and you're fun to be around,” he rambles, only to realize what he's doing. 

His face turns crimson and his jaw hangs open at his own stupidity. He waves his hands haphazardly and swings around, nearly toppling onto the sand in his hurry. “I— uh, never mind, I'll...I have to go see if Chan hyung's all right.” He dashes off, his heart pounding and his skin flushed. 

When he bursts into the bungalow, he's met with three pairs of eyes. He covers his face and groans, leaning against the wall and Changbin takes the initiative to speak. “Hey, Jinnie, you all right?”

“I'm an idiot, I'm so stupid, I'm so dumb,” Hyunjin grouses, face hiding behind his hands. 

“Tell us something we don't know,” Felix interjects before he can ramble on and Hyunjin flips him the bird.

“I’m just dumb, okay,” he huffs and Felix throws his hands up disarmingly.

“Woah, it was just a joke,” he hums before glancing back at Chan. “Channie hyung seems fine, I think he's finally sleeping,” he says, and Hyunjin breathes out a sigh of relief. 

“Good. I’m going to go take a shower, I can feel sand where it’s not supposed to be,” he announces, passing them to head to said bathroom. He feels something soft contact the back of his head and he glances back in time to see the throw pillow fall to the ground with a muted thump and Felix looking reasonably disgusted. 

“TMI, Jin,” the blonde exclaims and he just grins audaciously and pokes his tongue out at him before disappearing into the bathroom before Felix can throw another pillow at him.

  
  


 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

He emerges from the bathroom just in time to catch sight of Chan sitting up and Jeongin immediately hugging him because no matter how much their youngest hated them, Hyunjin knows that he loves them. Hyunjin breathes out and pops into his room, throwing on his clothes and hurrying back out. 

“You worried the kids sick,” Changbin remarks, messing with the man’s hair. 

Chan sits up and looks from one to the other slowly. He then shoots up from his seat, nearly knocking Jeongin over. “Breakfast!” he exclaims. 

“Chill, Chris,” Felix huffs, pulling him down onto the sofa again. “Binnie hyung took it off the stove and put it in the fridge. Nothing’s going to burn down, and even if it did, I’d just pay for the damages.” The man blinks owlishly down at him, and he purses his lips. “Yes, we managed to handle the kitchen without burning anything, Chris, don’t look so surprised.” 

“...well excuse me for not trusting you in a kitchen after what you all did last time.” 

“That was Hyunjin’s fault,” Felix defends. “I still don’t know how he got a live chicken—”

“When you said chicken, how was I supposed to know that it was supposed to be dead?” Hyunjin calls, head popping from the doorway of the bedroom, looking quite offended. 

“Because,” Felix drawls, “When you order chicken to  _ eat,  _ it’s generally supposed to be  _ dead  _ and  _ plucked  _ and  _ cooked?  _ How that didn’t get through your thick pretty-boy skull, I’ll never know.

“You were all hammered,” Jeongin points out. “And I never  _ ever  _ want to see Hyunjin hyung running around trying to pluck a live chicken while wearing argyle tube socks on his hands again.” 

Hyunjin huffs and grabs Changbin, pulling him to the other couch and hugging him like a throw pillow. “That’s right,” he declares triumphantly. “You couldn’t expect me to know the difference because we were all hammered!” He smirks.

“You sound way too proud of that. You know you shouldn’t be proud of that, right? Right..?” Chan asks, just looking terribly tired of their banter. “...anyway—” 

“Nice segue,” Changbin mutters from Hyunjin’s lap and Felix snorts. 

“ _ Anyway, _ ” Chan stresses. “Did you eat?” he glances at the clock hanging above the glass doors. “Did any of you eat? It’s nearly noon.”

“You really expected us to be able to eat breakfast like nothing was up while you were passed out on the couch, Chris? Wow, you really have less faith in us than we thought. I’m offended.”

“When are you not offended, Felicia,” Chris retorts. “The amount of times I’ve had to stop you all from going at each other’s throats is plenty proof that I have full rights to have no faith in any of you.” He looks over them. “So you haven’t eaten yet?” he asks. 

When he receives shaking heads as a response, he sighs and stands up again, Jeongin releasing him this time, and shakily makes his way to the kitchen. “I’ll go warm up the sandwiches then,” he states. “You need to eat.” Immediately, Felix is at his side. 

“I’ll help out. You’re not standing in front of a stove in this kind of condition,” he insists. Chan smiles gratefully at him.

Hyunjin hops onto the sofa, sitting on the back cushion with his feet on the seat, and he glances down to find Jeongin staring up at him. He grins and reaches down to pinch the youngest’s cheek only to have him move away before he can touch him. He pouts. “Can’t hyung give you affection?”

“No, hyung cannot,” Jeongin deadpans, scooting to the opposite edge of the couch, sufficiently out of his wingspan. “Hyung will pull my cheekbone off, and I like my cheekbone, thank you very much.” 

“I will not pull your cheekbone off, that’s bloody and this is a Gucci t-shirt!” Hyunjin responds defensively. He’s met with a borderline-glare from Jeongin, who doesn’t look too appreciative of his reassurance.

“Come here, Innie, hyung will protect you from the skinship maniac,” Changbin calls from the other couch, opening his arms, and Hyunjin gasps in sheer betrayal as Jeongin hops off the couch and practically runs into Changbin’s arms, settling himself comfortably there and poking his tongue out at him. Changbin smirks and tugs the younger boy against his chest.

“Hey, if  _ anyone  _ is a skinship maniac, it’s shorty hyung over there, not me,” Hyunjin denies vociferously. 

Jeongin shakes his head. “Changbin hyung’s fine as long as he doesn’t do aegyo. You’re the real hazard to my physical and mental health here.” 

“Okay, wow—” before Hyunjin has the chance to break into an offended ramble, Felix emerges from the kitchen and just about slams the plate of grilled cheese sandwiches onto the coffee table between them. 

“Everyone shut up and eat,” he declares.

Chan steps out of the kitchen behind him, spatula-brandishing hand resting on his hip. “I told you to tell them that the food was ready, Lix.” 

“Paraphrasing,” the blonde flings back airily. 

“Thanks for the food, hyung,” Changbin immediately groans, releasing Jeongin and grabbing a sandwich. “I thought I was gonna be a starved man back there.” 

“I’m so glad you only want me for my ability to cook passably,” is the drawled out response. 

“No, he really does care, hyung,” Jeongin promises sincerely as Changbin bites virtually half of the sandwich off. “If he only cared about you being able to cook you’d probably be dead because takeout exists.” 

“Gee, I feel so special.

Hyunjin hops off the couch and throws an arm around Chan’s shoulders. “You are, hyung, you are.” He grabs a sandwich and shoves it into Chan’s mouth before the man can say anything back, and he grins. “Get those calories, hyung!” he cheers a little too enthusiastically before grabbing a sandwich for himself. He takes an inconveniently large bite of it and promptly begins to choke.

“Karma,” he hears Jeongin whisper, and he doesn’t respond because he’s a little preoccupied with trying not to die. 

  
  


 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

Fortunately there had been no more mishaps although Hyunjin still had his guard up in case. After all, Chan had only slept for a few hours at best between making them breakfast and reviving from a fainting spell. Felix had insisted that they visit the aquarium at least once, and despite Changbin’s complaints about paying to see fish instead of paying to eat them. 

_ “We can see fish first and then we can eat them,” _ Felix had insisted. 

And that’s how Hyunjin found himself practically sprawled on the floor, gasping from laughter as Changbin hides behind Felix because “those moving rocks are evil! Look at those soulless eyes and that… hairbrush mouth...” while the blonde has the decency to look at least a little embarrassed at the man’s antics. 

“They’re called dugongs, hyung, and they aren’t evil, they’re literally like sea St. Bernards, they’re friendlier than Jeongin.” 

“Saint my ass,” Changbin huffs before letting out an undignified squawk as one of the lumbering creatures curiously draws closer to the glass to peer at them. “And everything is friendlier than our maknae even if nothing is cuter than him.”

“I’m hurt, hyung. Chan hyung is my favourite now,” Jeongin sniffs, moving to cinch his arms around the man’s waist from behind, resting his chin against Chan’s shoulder. 

“I’m not cuter than him?” Felix asks simultaneously, batting his eyelashes coyly at Changbin. 

The man stares at him, dumbfounded for a few moments. “Nope, no, the maknae is cuter,” he declares, looking away from Felix and coincidentally, back at the dugong that seemed to take an interest in him. He screeches and hides behind Felix again, and Hyunjin wipes tears of mirth from his eyes. 

“Our cute, dark hyung is scared of a- a—” he reads the description. “A sea cow!” he giggles, dissolving into laughter on the ground again.

“You’re a sea cow,” Changbin mutters darkly, and Hyunjin can’t even bring himself to be offended. He grabs Changbin’s ankle and leers up at him.

“Are you scared of me yet?” 

In response, the older man just halfheartedly kicks him, and he whines, pulling himself to his feet again. Chan, who had been watching the entire scene with ears crimson in secondhand embarrassment tilts his head back slightly to glance over at Jeongin. “Come on, Innie, let’s go see the jellyfish.”

“Yay, jellyfish!” Jeongin cheers as Chan pointedly walks away from them and to the jellyfish exhibit.

“Of course he’d like the jellyfish,” Changbin continues to mutter darkly as Felix pulls him out of the tunnel. “They’re brainless and heartless and they sting...just like him.” 

Felix huffs. “Hyung, there’s no need to turn on poor Innie because you’re scared of a gentle giant.”

“I’m not scared!”

Felix points behind Changbin, and he swivels around only to meet eyes with the dugong again. He shrieks and runs out of the tunnel, leaving behind Hyunjin and Felix. The two grin and exchange high fives before running after him before he got himself lost. 

Quite a while later, Hyunjin leaves the aquarium with a harp seal pup plushie because it was adorable and reminded him of Seungmin. He was amazed at the synchronization between the two, especially the cute way in which it would yawn, its face matching Seungmin’s when he laughed in that crinkle-eyed, open-mouthed way. Felix had complained that he wouldn’t stop staring at it and insisted that he buy one from the giftshop. To say the least, Hyunjin didn’t need to be told twice.

“Stop cuddling that thing like a creep, creep,” Felix calls from the front passenger seat of the car as Chan drives them back to their stay. Hyunjin has a striking suspicion that the man doesn’t mind the driving because it gives him an excuse to zone out on all of them and enjoy his moments of peace with a good reason to ignore them.

“You’re just jealous that Binnie hyung doesn’t cuddle you like this,” Hyunjin retorts, and that successfully shuts the blonde up for the rest of the ride. 

It’s early evening when they return back home (Changbin had decided not to eat fish because Jeongin seemed on the verge of tears when told that having seafood was an option after seeing all the sea creatures—they had settled with grill instead). They’re welcomed by the ungodly screeching of the seagulls. Of course, no greeting shouldn’t be returned somehow, so Jeongin ends up screeching right back at them. 

They pile out of the car, Hyunjin still holding onto his harp seal pup plushie protectively, the sudden urge coming over him to show it to Seungmin, but when he recalls the fool that he had made of himself that morning, he only blushes and hurries inside the bungalow. There was no way he could face the boy after that, Seungmin already saw him as weird enough without that virtual confession. He faceplants on the couch and groans loudly into the seat cushion, kicking his legs spasmodically.

“...you do realize that all of our posteriors have been where you have your face on at one point, right?” Felix calls shamelessly, unbuttoning the first few buttons of his shirt and plopping himself down on the couch.

Hyunjin immediately sits up and wipes his face animatedly. “ _ Ew,  _ Lix, let me gripe in peace for a bit, won’t you?”

“As your best friend, that’s not in my job contract,” Felix responds carelessly, waving him off with a hand. An eyebrow rides up on his face as he stares at Hyunjin. “What’s gotten into you anyway? You’re complaining about everything more than you usually do.” 

“It’s—”

“Hot naked boy?” Changbin interjects, tugging Chan into the bungalow by his collar and pushing him down to sit next to Felix. “Also, let Jeongin go play on the beach by himself, Chan hyung, he’s a legal adult, he doesn’t need your helicopter parenting.” 

“He’s barely an adult!” Chan argues, but is finally forced to concede when he’s met with three pointed stares and some vague screeching from outside. It was becoming increasingly difficult to tell whether it was from Jeongin or from the seagulls.

“So it  _ is  _ hot naked boy,” Felix crows after the longest moment of awkward silence. 

Hyunjin shakes his head fervently and hugs his harp seal pup to his chest, a defensive look in his eyes. “It’s not!” 

“Fess up, Jin,” Changbin drawls. “You’ve been moon-eyed ever since you mentioned him, and I know for a fact that you didn’t try to smuggle anything past airport security again, so unless you have some kind of connections here, you can’t be baked enough to visualize your hot naked boy.”

“It’s not him,” Hyunjin mutters, sounding rather defeated. 

“Australia is a big country,” Chan finally states, ever the voice of reason in all their nonsensical conversation. “You saw him once, and it’s not likely you’ll be able to run into him again,” he states, sounding almost apologetic.

_You can’t be more wrong,_ Hyunjin thinks. After all, Seungmin was just out there, so close but so far, with only a name and an ocean separating them. Hyunjin suddenly misses him, even though he had no real reason to. He looks down at the harp seal plushie and pokes its nose, his lips naturally falling into something that was almost a pout. He sighs and Felix breathes out slowly and deliberately.

“He’s whipped, guys.” 

“Never thought I’d see the day,” Chan replies, but when he flicks his fringe out of his eyes with a jerk of his neck, there’s a hint of worry in them.

Hyunjin is about to emphatically deny being whipped, because he wasn’t whipped, he just thought that Seungmin was the cutest, funniest, nicest but also not nicest, prettiest, most handsome boy in the worl— yeah, maybe he was whipped, but before he can, Jeongin comes barrelling into the living room with sparkles practically floating around him and stars in his eyes.

“Hyungs, I just had  _ the best  _ idea,” he announces.

“No, I don’t want to die today, Innie, but thank you for your consideration,” Felix responds, his voice patronizingly sweet, earning him a pillow thrown at his face.

Jeongin turns to look at Chan pleadingly. “Can we make a campfire and roast marshmallows, hyung? Please? Pleeease?”

"Why roast marshmallows when we can roast Hyunjin instead?" Felix interjects.

Jeongin wrinkles his nose at the blonde. "Hyung, that's cannibalism."

“I’ll get the marshmallows,” Changbin announces before the exchange could spiral further down the hellhole and before Chan even has the chance to respond because they all knew that Chan had the weakest of weak spots for the maknae. Jeongin cheers and throws his arms around the dark-haired man and Chan’s eyes soften.

“All right, let’s make a campfire,” he agrees.

That’s how Hyunjin finds himself with a mouthful of sand and scratches on his ankles as he drags wood across the beach as the sun sunk into the ocean like a giant tortilla chip into a bowl of dip. He hears his stomach growl and figures that he’s beginning to feel a little peckish. He huffs as he drops the wood into the pit that Chan had made for them before flopping down on the sand.

“Why is sand so hard to walk in?” he whines, rolling onto his back as Felix drops some more wood into the firepit.

“Why, did your dancer thighs fail you?” the blonde teases, crouching down beside him and poking him in the ribs causing him to convulse and squeal.

“All right, boys, get up, I’m lighting this baby up,” Chan announces, pulling a pack of matches out of his pocket.

Hyunjin makes a face. “Hyung, that’s—”

“Don’t you  _ dare  _ make another murder joke, Hwang Hyunjin, or I’ll put you in time out,” Chan threatens, and Hyunjin huffs.

“Well maybe if you used your vocabulary more appropriately then we wouldn’t be having this issue, mum.” 

“Stop talking like that, hyung, you sound like my middle school Language Arts teacher,” Jeongin whines from where he’s mounting those large campfire marshmallows on sticks for them to toast. 

Chan doesn’t wait for them as he tosses a lit match onto the tinder and coaxes the fire through the kindling and to the firewood. It blazes brightly as the sun continues to sink, and Felix eagerly holds his hands out towards its warmth as the cooling sea breeze rolls over them. 

“Everyone, all together now! _ Let’s gather round the campfire and sing our campfire song! _ ”

“ _ Our C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E S-O-N-G song! _ ” Chan bursts into song with him and Hyunjin groans, rolling over to Jeongin, uncaring that sand has gone down his (Gucci) t-shirt and probably down his shorts too. 

“Innie, save me, the kangaroos have run amok,” he huffs, and Jeongin pokes his cheek with one of the sticks. 

“There’s a fire right there, hyung, save yourself,” Jeongin replies candidly, and for a moment, Hyunjin does consider jumping in to save himself from the terror that was Felix and Chan ganging up and singing SpongeBob. 

Changbin looks up from where he’s helping Jeongin spear the marshmallows. “It takes two to three hours for a body to burn to ash and you probably don’t want to be burning for three hours while listening to them doing that,” he points out.

“Good point,” Jeongin hums nonchalantly.

“I don't want to know how or why you know that,” Hyunjin sighs.

Soon they’re happily toasting marshmallows (fortunately both Felix and Chan had ceased with their terrible serenading, and it had actually been quite a pleasant affair). Hyunjin has a few lines of melted chocolate smeared on his face like war paint, courtesy of Felix and was currently chewing on the umpteenth s’more of the night while Jeongin was dancing around with sparklers (Hyunjin isn’t sure where he had gotten them), drawing lines of light in the darkness, sometimes vaguely phallic, but they all turn a blind eye to it.

Somewhere in the light of the fire, Hyunjin can see Felix in Changbin’s lap and he can’t help but smile lazily at that as he watches the blonde feed Changbin a toasted marshmallow with such a bright grin that it probably put the fire to shame. He himself is laying with his head in Chan’s lap. The man had been awfully quiet for quite a while now, but maybe he was just doing one of those things where he just ignored them or something. 

Hyunjin suddenly yelps sharply as Chan stands up, sending his head plummeting down into the sand. He’s about to complain about it, but the man had begun to walk off in the darkness without so much as a word, and Hyunjin immediately sits up. “Hyung?” he calls. When there’s no sign of response, he stands up. “Hyung!” he calls louder.

How Chan had managed to walk so fast, Hyunjin doesn’t know, but he finds himself running to keep up with him, concerned, and the others hot on their heels. His eyes widen as the man scales the rocky outcrop easily and stands facing the exterior, where cove broke off into ocean. Hyunjin hurries after him, scraping his legs in the process since it was dark and not exactly easy to see. “Hyung! Chan hyung!” he calls loudly.

This time Chan does turn to face him, and Hyunjin freezes, his blood running cold. Chan’s eyes are bright, golden and glowing unnaturally. He says nothing as he slowly turns his back to Hyunjin again, and throws himself off of the rock, meeting the water in split-seconds. Hyunjin gasps and runs to the edge of the outcrop, looking down. He wasn’t surfacing. Hyunjin swears he feels his heart stop for a moment.  _ He wasn’t surfacing. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i feel like I'm just being mean to chan, poor baby...also Seungmin really does look like a yawning harp seal pup when he smiles :')
> 
> thank you for reading, I'll see you all next chapter!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we've passed 1k hits, thank you all so much ;-; what did i ever do to deserve you guys  
> i could keep gushing on about that but no one wants to hear that, so let's just get on with the story

Hyunjin shakes, his legs giving out on him as he falls onto his hands and knees, staring down at where the waves crashed into the rock, waiting for Chan to pop up and laugh at him for being so dramatic before swimming into the cove. The longer he waits, his hands bruise from how they’re clenched into tight fists against the rock.

Felix is the first to catch up with him, eyes wide and breaths coming in pants. “Jin, what happened?” he asks, breathless and very evidently worried. Hyunjin just shakes his head jerkily and stares down at the water, terror flooding his gut and spreading over his body, rendering him unable to speak and making it rather difficult to breathe for that matter.

By the time Jeongin and Changbin arrive, Hyunjin knows that he hadn’t been imagining things. It wasn’t like Chan— and he swears that he had seen his eyes glowing. He had seen eyes glowing like that before, although it had been so vague that he had assumed it was a trick of the moonlight.

Before he has the chance to scream out the name in fear and anger, a figure breaks the surface with another paler one in its grip and Hyunjin gasps in before bursting into sobs of relief. His eyes meet Seungmin’s for the briefest of moments, and he smiles slightly despite the fact that he was crying in a considerably undignified manner. He knows that Seungmin hadn’t lied to him.

“There’s someone down there!” he hears Changbin exclaim, and immediately he shoots to his feet and bolts down the outcrop to the shore as Seungmin swims closer to him, Chan held in his arms. When he finally makes it to their spot (Hyunjin had taken to referring to the sheltered area as ‘their spot’ now), Hyunjin lifts Chan’s body out of his arms and lays the man on the sand, wasting no time in helping him.

Hyunjin can feel Seungmin’s eyes on him, body mostly submerged, as Chan comes to with a cough and spluttering of salty water, and Hyunjin can’t help but feel an odd sense of deja vu. He shakes it off as he helps Chan sit up and rubs his back firmly. “Hyung, hyung are you all right?” he asks him, his voice slightly hoarse, tears still blooming in his eyes and spilling down his cheeks.

Chan hacks out more salt water and spits it into the sand beside them before staring blearily at Hyunjin with red-rimmed eyes. “Wh-what happened?” he asks slowly, his voice hoarse, cracking and breathier than usual.

“Hyung!” Hyunjin moves away just as Jeongin barrels past him and throws his arms around Chan’s neck, hugging him tightly. “What got into you?!”

“Chris, what happened back there?” Felix hollers from the distance, Changbin running beside him with what looked like a towel draped over his shoulder. When they arrive, Changbin drapes the towel around his shoulders and he clings to it gratefully.

“I— don’t know what happened,” he admits honestly, coughing.

Felix’s brow creases. “We’ll talk later. Let’s get you back inside first,” he states. “Do you think you can walk or—?”

“I can walk,” Chan insists, standing up slowly on clearly shaky legs. Felix immediately takes his arm and throws it over his shoulders before wrapping the other one around him, supporting him.

“I’ll put out the fire,” Hyunjin announces, and they nod, leading Chan away and back to the bungalow. Hyunjin watches them go for a few moments before ducking down and staring at Seungmin, wiping his eyes and willing his easily-provoked tears to flee. He smiles a smile of utter relief at the young man. “Thank you,” he expresses softly. “Thank you, thank you so much for saving him...I’m sorry for doubting you.”

Seungmin emerges to the hip and Hyunjin really can’t stop his mind from thinking that he was just so _beautiful,_ but now he doesn’t even try to deny it. Really, no matter how many times he saw him adorned in his delicate lace-esque golden chains and jewels, he couldn’t take his eyes off of him. Seungmin offers him a slight smile, although there’s an unreadable look in his eyes.

“You’re lucky I felt something strange in the waves,” he tells him slowly. “I understand that your friend did not voluntarily do that?”

Hyunjin shakes his head immediately. “No, he didn’t. I...I swear that before he jumped, I saw his eyes glow. It wasn’t him that jumped,” Hyunjin relates, voice hushed. “It…” he hesitates. “It reminded me of you.”

“Hyunjin, now really isn’t the time to be infatuated with me—”

“No, no, I mean—” Hyunjin blushes. “I didn’t mean it like that!” he defends.

“Could’ve fooled me,” Seungmin quips before sighing. “You can stop being flustered now and tell me what you wanted to.”

Hyunjin clears his throat and stands a little straighter. “Yeah...anyway, it reminded me of you because that night I swear your eyes glowed too. And his eyes…”

Seungmin’s brow furrows in confusion. “I swear it’s not me, Hyunjin.”

“I know it isn’t you...but are there others like you? Maybe it’s one of them,” Hyunjin suggests a little breathlessly.

Seungmin submerges himself to his shoulders and shakes his head without a moment’s hesitation. “There are others, yes, but they would never do anything like that,” he insists. “They’re not like that. They…” he drifts off, his eyes shifting to the side for a moment before he meets Hyunjin’s eyes again. “They would never do anything like that.”

The conviction in Seungmin’s voice is the most emotion that Hyunjin has ever heard from him, and he’s inclined to believe it. He nods resignedly. “If you say so,” he sighs. He purses his lips. “I should probably go put out the fire and check on Chan hyung—” he turns around and promptly shrieks when he sees Jeongin standing silently behind him, wide-eyed. “Jeongin? How long have you been there?!”

“The whole time,” both Seungmin and Jeongin respond simultaneously, and Hyunjin whips around to stare accusingly at Seungmin.

“You knew he was here the entire time and you never told me?” he squeaks indignantly.

Seungmin merely shrugs. “I thought you already knew.”

Hyunjin groans as Jeongin pads forward curiously. “..are you the hot naked boy that Hyunjin hyung is whipped for?” he asks curiously.

Seungmin raises an eyebrow and looks Jeongin up and down before eyeing himself and clearing his throat. “I...I guess I am,” he responds, much to Hyunjin’s chagrin.

“So...are you a fishboy? Mermaid? Mer _man_? Your neck is weird,” Jeongin points out with little tact or delicacy.

“Siren,” Seungmin corrects nonchalantly. “And you are?”

“Jeongin. Yang Jeongin. And please don’t leave me alone with Hyunjin hyung or he’ll be clingy again.” Hyunjin pouts as the two have their casual conversation right in front of him.

“I wanted to come and see your friend anyway, I need to check him over,” Seungmin states agreeably. “I’ll come with you.” He looks Jeongin up and down again. “I don’t blame Hyunjin for being clingy with you though. You are cute.”

And Jeongin blushes. _Blushes._ Hyunjin feels a wave of jealousy course through his veins at the sight. He hadn’t come off so well with Seungmin when they had first met, and Jeongin seemed to already be on his good side. As much as Hyunjin loved their maknae, it irritated him that the two were getting along so well.

“I’ll...go put out the fire,” he announces again, his voice cracking unintentionally. “You two go back there first.”

Seungmin turns to stare at him and Hyunjin tenses slightly because it was incredibly unfair how beautiful his eyes were. Seungmin nods. “I’ll help you,” he decides, ducking under the water. Hyunjin watches him swim over to a cleft in the rocky outcrop and tug from it the shirt and shorts that he had given him. Despite the cold burn of jealousy in his gut, he couldn’t quite ignore the warmth he felt when he saw that Seungmin had kept the clothes he had given him.

He watches as Seungmin pulls himself onto the cleft and changes, his frame obscured by the shadow of the rock. He yelps as he feels an elbow jab him in the ribs and he turns to meet Jeongin’s deviously grinning fox eyes. “Nice catch, hyung,” the younger boy remarks with a whistle and Hyunjin feels the blood rush to his neck. He’s suddenly glad that it’s nighttime.

Seungmin jumps off the ledge and lands gracefully on the sand, his chains that peeked out from beneath the clothing glimmering. He pads over to them and meets Hyunjin’s eyes. “Let’s go put the fire out, Hyunjin, Jeongin.”

“You’re hot— I mean the fire! The fire is hot, we’d better put it out before it gets too big and out of hand—” Hyunjin declares a little too loudly, marching off. Seungmin and Jeongin exchange a look, and Jeongin smirks.

“Isn’t he smooth?” the fox-eyed boy hums.

“Very,” Seungmin sarcastically agrees.

“I hope you know that he’s literally been pining over you nonstop for the last few days and it’s getting annoying,” Jeongin tells Seungmin. “But don’t tell him I said that.”

“You didn’t need to tell me for me to know,” Seungmin responds, tapping his ear with a smile that was a little too pleasant. The two exchange laughter as they make their way after a Hyunjin that, in all his agitation had forgotten that fire was hot and was currently yelping and running to soak his hands at the shoreline animatedly while the flames licked mockingly at the area where he stood just moments before.

Seungmin makes his way over to Hyunjin and lifts his hands out of the water, flipping them palms up. His lips quirk up slightly and Hyunjin's eyes widen as he chuckles. “Clumsy,” he scolds. “You don't touch fire.” He blows a cool breath over Hyunjin's hands and then releases them in favour of scooping up a handful of seawater and making his way back to the fire.

Hyunjin watches, dumbfounded, as a simple handful of water and a breath from the boy both puts out the blaze on the beachside and cools the burning sensation in his hands. He wryly wonders if Seungmin can do the same thing for the burning sensation in his chest, but he supposes that wasn't possible considering Seungmin was the _cause_ of it. He looks down at his hands and blushes as he imagines Seungmin holding them again ( _no_ he was most certainly not _whipped_ . He was just completely gone for the siren boy. _No, Felix, they do not mean the same thing._ )

Seungmin waves him over and he scrambles to his feet, hurrying after him and trying to ignore Jeongin's piercing stare and Joker grin.

“By the way, why do you have…” Seungmin gesticulates at Hyunjin's face and he reaches up to touch his cheek only for his hand to come away stained with chocolate his face reddens.

“It was Felix,” he huffs, eyes falling to the sand.

Jeongin giggles beside him and he chooses not to dignify it with a response of any kind. He steps past the doorway and eyes the scene before him, with Felix forcefully having Chan on the couch, wrapped in a fleece blanket. Hyunjin’s shoulders sink in relief when he sees that the man doesn’t seem too much worse for the wear. Honestly, he had probably only been under the water for a few minutes, but it had felt like hours.

“Chan hyung, there’s someone who wants to see you,” he announces slowly as Jeongin ducks past him and pulls Felix aside to whisper into his ear.

The man glances up at him with a confused look in his eyes. “This late in the night?”

Hyunjin purses his lips. “He’s the one that saved you,” he informs plainly, moving aside so that Seungmin could walk in. Chan’s eyes widen and he stares at the boy in silence for a few moments.

“I’m Seungmin,” Seungmin greets politely, bowing for extra measure, and Hyunjin just stands by the doorway watching him in silence.

Chan seems to take a few moments to gather himself before standing up suddenly, shedding the blanket. “Can I get you anything to drink?” he asks. “Anything to eat? Have a seat.”

Hyunjin frowns and moves ahead, pushing him down onto the couch again and throwing the blanket over him. “You sit down,” he huffs. “If he wants anything to eat or drink, I’ll get it for him or something. You need to rest, hyung.”

Seungmin looks from one to the other awkwardly, and Hyunjin shoots him a lax smile. “Take a seat,” he invites, motioning to the other couch. “I’ll grab some water.” He disappears into the kitchen, leaving Seungmin to sit awkwardly on the couch, sitting upright.

“So...I’m lucky you were there,” Chan chuckles awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck. “Thanks for that.”

“You’re welcome,” Seungmin responds. “But I want to know what you were doing there in the first place,” he informs, going straight to the point, clearly not intent on beating around the bush.

“I could say the same for you,” Chan responds as Hyunjin returns with a glass of water for Seungmin. The boy stares at it before accepting it and taking a sip. Hyunjin swears he can see bliss crossing Seungmin’s eyes for the briefest of moments. Seungmin lowers the glass into his lap and meets Chan’s eyes again, waiting for him to respond, clearly not intent on answering the implied question.

Chan sighs. “I’m not sure. I feel as though I blanked out in that moment. I wasn’t thinking, I could only feel, and it felt like I was being pulled into the sea.” He shakes his head. “When I hit the water, of course I wanted to swim back to the surface, but I couldn’t. I felt heavy.”

Seungmin listens with a slow nod and drinks a little more water. “Are you feeling all right now?” he asks Chan slowly.

Chan laughs slightly, his voice still a little hoarse. “All things considered, it could be worse,” he responds. “Again, thank you for preventing that.”

Seungmin sets the glass down on the table and wait— when had he finished it? Hyunjin stares stupidly at the glass until he hears the brunette speak again. “If it’s not intruding, I’d like to...stay with all of you for a little bit?” Seungmin shifts on the sofa, his hands moving to rest on the edge of the seat cushion. “I want to make sure that nothing like that happens again.”

“Why would it?” Chan suddenly interjects, a glint of suspicion in his eyes.

Seungmin crosses his arms over his chest and tilts his head slightly. “Because Hyunjin hypothesizes that what caused your behaviour was because of people like me, and as much as I don’t believe it, I want to make sure that it isn’t true.”

“People like you?” Changbin suddenly brings up.

Seungmin nods. “Sirens.”

“Sirens don’t exist though?” Changbin queries skeptically. “And before you point out your ‘gills’, for all I know, it could be body modification. People do all kinds of things nowadays.”

“Wait,” Chan interrupts again before Seungmin can respond. “Sing.”

Seungmin meets his eyes before frowning. Hyunjin draws in a slow breath, but before he has the chance to even exhale, Seungmin begins to sing. It’s a different song from what Hyunjin had heard that last night. It’s sweet and soft, riding easily over the air. Unlike the dark tune that had dragged Hyunjin’s mind to the depths of the sea, his voice rang with something brighter, hopeful almost. And as he sings, his eyes take on a silverish hue, fixed on Chan.

Soon, Chan’s eyes mirror his own, coloured in an unnatural silverish colour. Hyunjin frowns. Chan’s eyes had been an unnerving golden before so at the very least he could assure himself that it wasn’t Seungmin. When the boy falls silent, it takes Chan a few moments to shake himself out of the trancelike state he had been trapped in.

“...I guess you were telling the truth after all,” Changbin murmurs slowly.

“Your voice is different from the one I heard,” Chan immediately states. “The one I heard was...like yours. Captivating. But the timbre was different. Darker..”

Seungmin’s frown deepens at his words and he nods. “I see.” He breathes out slowly. “I...we aren’t fond of humans,” he admits. “But I wouldn’t hurt one. I just...wouldn’t want to be near one.” He shakes his head. “So I want to ensure that you’re all safe for however long you’re staying here.”

“Well…” Felix suddenly pipes up. “We’re actually here for the whole summer so…”

Seungmin sighs. “That’s...a long time.” He doesn’t look too pleased about it, and Hyunjin can’t help but feel hurt by his lack of enthusiasm. It seriously couldn’t have meant anything to Seungmin when he thinks about it logically, but he wished that the boy could sympathize with the way he felt. He’s well aware by now that Seungmin must be aware of his _not-whipped_ state after all the slipups he had made, but that only somehow made rejection all the more real.

“Well, I guess you’re stuck with us for the summer then,” Felix declares, looking all too pleased for whatever reason. He grins. “Don’t worry, we’ll become _best friends_ in no time, mate!”

“Oh, joy,” Seungmin deadpans.

“I thought we were best friends!” Hyunjin whines at Felix, causing Seungmin to glance back at him with a raised eyebrow.

“Only by convenience,” Felix responds unreservedly. “Also, go wipe the chocolate off your face, you look like you wanna murder someone, Jin.”

“Yeah, I want to murder you. You’re the one that put it on me anyway,” Hyunjin retorts with a huff, but runs off to clean the sweet substance from his face and do a cleanse before he got pimples off of it or something.

“You must be Felix,” Seungmin states after a moment.

“Aw, does Jinnie talk about me?”

“Most of the time he complains about you.”

“Just know that whatever he said about me is probably a lie.”

Seungmin looks from Felix to the others. “He talks about you all a lot.” He gestures towards the fair-skinned man, “You’re Chan,” his hand shifts over to Changbin. “Changbin,” his eyes then fall on the youngest. “And you’re Jeongin, but you already told me that.”

“All we know about you is that Hyunjin hyung presumably saved you drowning and that you’re hot when you’re naked and you have a nice voice,” Jeongin pipes up.

Seungmin looks down at himself and toys with the chain that hung down his forearm and connected to another that wrapped his wrist like a bracelet. “I wouldn’t know,” he responds honestly. “Hyunjin did save me, but my voice is just a product of what I am and...well, wearing clothes isn’t normal to me like it is for all of you.” He doesn’t sound ashamed in the slightest. “It’s inconvenient and heavy when you leave the water. It’s much easier to move around without them.”

“Well this is the second culture shock of my life,” Felix remarks dryly before leaning forward eagerly and looking Seungmin up and down. “Do you have a tail? Like a mermaid?”

“Mermaids don’t exist,” Seungmin immediately shoots down with a frown, his gaze suddenly cold. He pauses for a few moments, his gaze on the ground, before speaking. “No, I don’t have a tail.”

“Wings?” Chan suddenly brings up curiously. “Weren’t sirens half-bird?”

“That’s myth,” Seungmin strikes down again. “They just assumed the bird part because of our voices.”

They fall into silence again, and after a few moments, Felix sighs. “This is awkward.”

“One of your friends nearly died and a stranger suddenly barges into your life,” Seungmin informs frankly. “Of course it’s awkward.” He purses his lips. “The tension is thicker than being surrounded by water. I can suggest sleeping it all off for now because it’s been a lot to process.”

At least he had said everything they were all thinking.

“Sounds good to me,” Chan suddenly agrees, standing up. “I’m going to see if I can sleep tonight.”

“Well I’m definitely done with this for the day...month..next decade,” Changbin decides, turning about face. “I’m gonna crash. Wanna join me, Lix?”

Felix’s lips spread into a bright grin and he nods. “Sure thing, hyung.”

“See ya, lovebirds,” Jeongin coos as the two head off and Felix ducks his head for a moment before running back and throwing a pillow at the youngest who only defends himself with another before throwing another pillow back at him. Chan and Changbin exchange a look before both retreating into the rooms to avoid being caught in the crossfire.

Hyunjin, unfortunately, isn’t as lucky as he’s promptly beaned with a pillow the moment he steps out of the bathroom, and his first instinct is to grab it and hurl it at Felix, who was currently squealing and attempting to shield himself with his arms as Jeongin straddles him and begins to whack him solidly with the pillow in his own grip. This put Jeongin in Hyunjin’s scope and the pillow that was intended for Felix drives itself into the side of Jeongin’s head.

Hyunjin squawks as he becomes the focal point of Jeongin’s destructiveness, the younger hopping off of Felix and instead jumping onto him, dragging him down onto the rug and holding him in a chokehold while Felix approaches them with a wild grin and his weapon of choice in his hand, one of the couch cushions that he had pulled off.

Hyunjin shrieks and covers his face with his arms. “This is double-teaming, no fair!” he wails. “I’m too young and pretty to die!”

“You are neither young nor pretty, Jin,” Felix drawls as he brings the cushion down and Hyunjin veritably screams, although he’s laughing by now because Jeongin is _tickling_ him, and this was so unfair.

When the two finally let him crawl off, gasping for breath and whimpering pitifully (not because he was hurt or anything, but merely because he was Hyunjin), his gaze catches Seungmin’s and he freezes. The boy had been sitting on the couch in silence the entire time and Hyunjin’s face turns scarlet as he realizes that the boy must have witnessed the entire thing.

Behind him, Felix and Jeongin exchange a look before Felix returns the seat cushion to its place and they both skulk off to their rooms, Felix to Changbin’s and Jeongin to his and Felix’s, successfully leaving Hyunjin at the mercy of the brunette.

“Uh...hi?” Hyunjin tries, picking himself off of his stomach and sitting cross-legged on the floor.

Seungmin offers him his hand and he takes it, his cheeks still dusted rose, allowing the boy to pull him up and onto the couch beside himself. “What was that?” Seungmin asks him, sounding more curious than anything while Hyunjin is trying to ignore the fact that Seungmin was still holding his hand.

“You mean Innie and Lix being little demons?”

Seungmin cocks an eyebrow at him and he pouts.

“It’s called a pillow fight,” Hyunjin informs. “You take pillows and you throw them at each other or hit each other with them for fun.”

“This...pillow fight...is fun?” Seungmin asks slowly.

Hyunjin huffs. “Unless your two backstabbing friends decide to gang up on you and tickle you while hitting you with a couch cushion.”

Seungmin looks amused at his words, but doesn’t say anything of it. Instead, he picks up the empty glass from the coffee table and holds it out to Hyunjin. “Could you get me more water?” he asks him, and Hyunjin jumps to his feet, taking the glass immediately and running off to fill it up.

He returns and Seungmin’s eyes practically sparkle when he receives the glass. Hyunjin finds it oddly charming. As Seungmin sips at the water, he watches him curiously. “...so why are you so excited to have water anyway?” he asks him.

Seungmin looks down at his glass and chuckles softly, and Hyunjin wouldn’t have thought anything of it if the tips of Seungmin’s ears weren’t slightly pinker than normal. “It tastes nice. I’ve never tasted freshwater or purified water before.”

Hyunjin’s eyes widen. “You—”

“Have never tasted purified water? No, I live in the sea.” Seungmin glances over at him.

“Then what do you drink?” Hyunjin asks him incredulously.

Seungmin shrugs. “I don’t. I don’t need to. But...if I’m up here, I’ll probably be drinking a lot or I’ll dehydrate.”

“That’s right...you’re out of your element.” Hyunjin eyes him, concerned. “Are you all right? You have to wear clothes, you’ll need to drink a lot of water, are you sure you want to stay here?”

“I need to make sure of something…” Seungmin frowns. “I’m staying here until we get to the bottom of this.”

Hyunjin squeezes his hand slightly without even realizing it. “Not to mention you’re freezing. Are you sure you’re feeling all right?”

“It’s just cold blood,” Seungmin insists. “As long as I can keep warm, I’m fine.”

Hyunjin offers him a slight smile. “If you say so.” He stands up. “I should probably try sleep myself or Innie will suffocate me with his thighs again tomorrow morning—”

“Pardon?” Seungmin looks bemused by his words. He shakes his head.

“You’re better off not knowing.” He pauses. “Do you want to share the bed with me?” he asks, congratulating himself on not blushing and melting into a puddle of embarrassment on the floor. He mentally gives himself a pat on the back. _Congratulations, Hwang Hyunjin, you’re no longer acting like a lovestruck teenager!_

“Sure,” Seungmin responds simply and stands up as well. Hyunjin nods, making his way to his room, pausing by the bathroom again to wash his face and brush his teeth before heading inside and flopping down on the bed. It was big enough that they’d be able to fit on it without making any contact, so he figures he should be fine.

What he doesn’t expect is for Seungmin to remove the clothes he was wearing and then go on to carefully remove his golden chains and the jewels that dripped off them with care, setting it aside on the bedside table. His face heats up as Seungmin lays down on the bed looking absolutely _breathtaking_ and Hyunjin really didn’t need this right now. He hides his face behind his hands in embarrassment and turns his back to Seungmin before the blood went from his face to somewhere else that Hyunjin really didn’t need it to.

It really wasn’t fair, how the person he had the biggest crush on ( _Congratulations, Hwang Hyunjin, you have just reverted back to the lovestruck and probably hormonal teenager that you always were_ ) was completely oblivious to the norms of living as a human and was currently lying beside him, very much naked. The fact that he had a body chiseled by the gods really didn’t help either. Hyunjin inhales deeply and wills himself to calm down.

“Night, Seungmin,” he calls, reaching to shut off the lamp, wincing at how his voice cracks.

“Goodnight, Hyunjin.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yay for developing relationships ~  
> thank you for reading, I'll see you in the next chapter ^^


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i feel like i need to thank all of you with every chapter because you're all so kind with your kudos and adorable with your comments~ i have the best readers <3 thank you for 200+ kudos!!

In hindsight, Hyunjin should have probably realized that offering to share a bed with Seungmin would have been a pretty bad idea regardless of how much clothing he was wearing because Hyunjin is a clingy sleeper, and needed to hug something, whether it be a pillow or a Felix, or a Jeongin if their youngest was feeling particularly generous. 

The youngest was not feeling particularly generous, as Hyunjin was soon to find out, when the screech of  _ “Felix hyung, they did the frickle frackle!”  _ resounds through the bungalow, waking Hyunjin up better than his own alarm ever would.

He blinks until his vision focusses and he tenses when he sees Seungmin glancing down at him curiously from where he had his arms wrapped around the brunette’s waist, his head presumably pressed against the boy’s cool chest. His face immediately stains scarlet and he jerks away, only for a hand to hold him in place.

“No...stay there, it’s warm,” Seungmin insists, as though he didn’t understand how this could be misinterpreted by anyone who saw them; presumably, it had already been misinterpreted by Jeongin.

Hyunjin’s face remains pitifully crimson as Felix’s head pops in through the doorway (he would think it counterintuitive to even  _ want  _ to do that after Jeongin’s ear-splitting proclamation, but he had the worst friends, so really, he shouldn’t be surprised), and he hides his face in Seungmin’s chest as Felix grins from ear to ear and shuts the door on them without a word. Somehow Hyunjin finds that more terrifying than if the blonde was to mimic Jeongin’s (false) broadcasting.

“What did he say? Frickle frackle?” Seungmin asks curiously, and his voice doesn’t sound sleep-ridden at all, leading Hyunjin to believe that he had been awake for a while, which makes his face even redder if at all possible because  _ how long  _ had Seungmin been aware that he had been clinging to him and not done anything about it?

“Just...just ignore them,” Hyunjin mumbles, figuring that if he didn't see Seungmin's face then maybe the embarrassment would dwindle. Unfortunately, considering how his method of not looking at Seungmin's face was to hide his own face in Seungmin's chest against his cool, sun-kissed skin, his embarrassment didn't lessen as he had hoped.

Seungmin nods and chuckles as he eyes Hyunjin, and somewhere in the corner of his mind that was currently blaring sirens (the eoeoeo ones, not the Seungmin ones) telling him that he should really get his face off of Seungmin's toned chest, he wonders just how the boy can be remotely cheerful in the morning. How the  _ hell  _ can someone be so perfect that they have a  _ smile  _ on their face so early in the morning?

(In reality, it wasn't that early at all, but Hyunjin never was and never will be a morning person).

“If you don't want to get up right now, you don't need to,” Seungmin points out, his voice slightly nasally in that way that Hyunjin found unforgivably adorable. “You were up late last night and you're on vacation right? So you should be able to get more rest.”

“Marry me,” Hyunjin groans then and there because he swears that Seungmin's words are those of angels singing. He realizes what he's said only a good few seconds after he's spoken and flushes down to his neck again. “Actually, forget I even exist, I want to crawl in a hole and die a quick and painless death,” he decides. He hears that infuriatingly cute chuckle again and feels something cold rest on the back of his head. Belatedly he realizes that it's Seungmin's hand. But his mind was on overload at the moment, and really, where Seungmin's hand was on his being was the least of Hyunjin's worries.

“We barely know each other, Hyunjin, I'm not going to marry you. I don't even like humans.”

Hyunjin just about wilts in Seungmin's grip at the words and pouts, finally shifting to look up at him, his chin resting on Seungmin's sternum. “Not even me?” He tries, giving him his best puppy dog eyes.

Seungmin rolls his eyes, his hand shifting to flick Hyunjin gently between the eyes. “I don't like humans,” he repeats, firmly and without hesitation.

Hyunjin's pout deepens and he returns his face back to Seungmin's chest, honestly too embarrassed to even care about being embarrassed anymore. He falls silent and stays silent for a bit, understanding that this was probably a touchy subject for Seungmin, although why was beyond him. Although humans could be pretty terrible, so he supposes that Seungmin's behaviour wasn't completely unreasonable. That didn't mean it didn't hurt to be so blatantly rejected. Hwang Hyunjin was used to rejecting, not being rejected. He wasn't the kind of jerk that would lead people on if he felt nothing for them.

For how much longer he remains cuddled up against Seungmin (the discomfort of it had eventually faded when Hyunjin's natural tendency to be touchy-feely kicked in, but that didn't mean the rollercoaster ride his stomach decided to embark on had stopped) he isn't sure, but he's snapped out of the comfortable reverie when the brunette speaks. “I'm thirsty.”

Hyunjin immediately hops out of bed. “I’ll get you some water.”

Seungmin slips out as well, and Hyunjin tells himself to focus, to keep his eyes on Seungmin’s face. “You have to show me how to get water so that I can do it myself,” he states frankly.

Hyunjin stares blankly at him for a few moments before pursing his lips. “You have to put on clothes first,” he tells him. “Lucky for you, I bought you a bunch!” he grins and moves over to the bags of clothes that he hadn’t removed since he had purchased them. Now Seungmin was here to wear them at least, so he hefts the bags over to the bed and grins at Seungmin. “Choose whatever you like. They’re all yours!”

“Mine?” Seungmin hums, surprise glinting in his eyes. It makes Hyunjin feel oddly self-satisfied. He nods, and Seungmin looks through the clothes quietly. “You shouldn’t have. Money is hard to earn for you humans, isn’t it?”

Hyunjin shrugs slightly. “I...just wanted to get you something to wear,” he responds lamely, looking down at the floor. 

That chuckle again. Hyunjin wonders if Seungmin will start vomiting rainbows with how perfect he is. “You know I don’t like or need to wear clothes, Hyunjin.”

“I know, but I don’t want everyone to see you walking around everywhere naked, excuse me for wanting to protect your privacy.”  _ And maybe keep that sight to myself.  _ Hyunjin feels blood rush to his cheeks at his own thoughts.

“You aren’t the only one that’s seen me naked.”

Hyunjin’s eyes widen. “D-did I—”

“Say that out loud? Yes, you did.”

Hyunjin groans and faceplants onto the bed. “Just kill me now and save me from embarrassing myself even more than I already have…” he whines, his voice muffled by the mattress. He felt so utterly mortified that goosebumps lined his skin down the entirety of his frame.

“I’ll wear these.” Hyunjin turns his head so that his cheek is pressed against the mattress and glances over Seungmin’s choices. They were loose clothes, of course, an oversized hoodie, t-shirt and a pair of joggers.

Hyunjin nods and turns to head out the door. “I'll go wash up, you can get dressed.”

“All right.”

Hyunjin flashes Seungmin a quick smile before hurrying out to the bathroom and promptly shutting the door before leaning his back against it and just slowly and far too dramatically sliding down until he's sitting on the cold, tiled floor. He buries his face in his hands and tries to decide whether he wants to wither from mortification or squeal in sheer happiness. He ends up letting out a sound that vaguely sounds like a crying moose.

After a few minutes of just groaning out his  _ feelings  _ (he still wasn't quite sure what exactly those feelings were), Hyunjin stands and jumps into the shower, dousing himself in cold water and promptly shrieking, his breath trapping itself in his lungs as he gasps. He twists the temperature to something warmer and finishes his shower as soon as possible, quickly brushing his teeth and changing into a fresh set of clothes.

He opens the door, nearly braining Seungmin with it, the brunette was standing so close. He blinks, staring at Seungmin, dressed in the oversized clothes and looking very  _ very  _ huggable, and Hyunjin doesn’t think he’s wanted to hug someone so badly his entire life.

“Water..?” Seungmin just asks simply, and Hyunjin bolts to the kitchen to grab a glass and fill it with water.

“He’s not limping...you think he topped?” Changbin stage whispers to Jeongin from the table where they’re very obviously sitting and judging Hyunjin’s every move.

Hyunjin whirls around and glares at them. “We didn’t do anything! I just...ended up cuddling him..while sleeping..”

“Suuure you did,” Jeongin chirps, evil glinting in his eyes.

Hyunjin huffs and sticks his nose up in the air and parades out of the kitchen. “I did,” he declares, making his way down the hall where he can already see the amused glint in Seungmin’s almond eyes. He blushes, realizing the ridiculousness of the entire situation.

“H-here’s your water,” he stammers, offering the boy the glass.

Seungmin accepts it with a nod. “Thank you, Hyunjin.” He downs in in seconds and a droplet slips down the furrow created by the corner of his mouth, dripping down his chin. His lips glisten, and Hyunjin can’t help but stare. He wants to kiss him. Really badly. “My eyes are up here,” Seungmin calls and Hyunjin’s gaze snaps up. He blushes when he sees the knowing glint in the brunettes gaze.

He pouts, and reaches out to wipe the droplet of water from the corner of Seungmin’s lips. He feels the boy tense under his touch, and catches sight of his eyes widening ever so slightly in well-concealed surprise, which Hyunjin takes as a victory on his part, although he wasn’t exactly sure what kind of game this was to begin with. Seungmin didn’t even like him, or humans in general. He knows he’s playing a losing match, but he can’t seem to stop. “Drink slower or you’ll choke,” he hums.

“Can you not flirt in the hall?” Felix suddenly yells, running through the door and pointing an accusing finger at them.

Hyunjin sputters. “We’re not flirting! I just got him a glass of water!”

Jeongin pops out of the kitchen, screen of his phone brandished, and Hyunjin’s eyes widen as he sees the image snapped of him staring  _ pointedly _ at Seungmin’s lips while wiping off the water droplet with his thumb, his ears somewhat red, while Seungmin’s eyes are wide and staring at him. “Not flirting,” the maknae crows. “Suuuure.”

“Hey, where’s Chan hyung?” Hyunjin loudly interjects in blatant attempt to divert the conversation. Fortunately, it seems to do the trick.

“Sleeping,” Felix responds without missing a beat, and Hyunjin relaxes, a relieved smile curling onto his lips. It’s mirrored on Felix’s face, and suddenly all is well with the world.

“Finally,” he sighs, stepping past to collapse onto the couch. “He’s sleeping.”

“Well, he nearly drowned last night, I’d be surprised if it didn’t take a lot out of him,” Changbin calls from the table, his eyes darting to Chan’s room. “So if you kids are gonna make noise, then at least go out and do it so you don’t wake him up.”

“Since when did you become responsible, hyung?” Jeongin asks curiously, pocketing his phone.

Changbin just glares at the younger and turns away, lips pursed. Felix chuckles at that. “He was joking, hyung, no need to be mopey over it.” He drapes himself over Changbin from behind and pokes his cheek. “Something the matter?” he asks, his voice quieter. “You usually have a lot of patience with Innie.”

Hyunjin watches them, and debates on teasing Felix after all that Felix had teased him for, but he decides to be the better person in their friendship and leave them be. Besides, it seemed that Jeongin was already doing all the work with his brandished phone and foxy grin.

With a sigh, Hyunjin lets his head fall against the back cushion of the couch. His eyes close and he sits there, as still as a statue, until he feels the cushion sink somewhat. He opens his eyes and glances over to find Seungmin sitting beside him, looking somewhat uncomfortable. Hyunjin owes it to the clothes. He sits upright and faces Seungmin properly. “Everything is all right right now,” he tells him. “Do you want to go for a swim?” He’s sure that Seungmin would feel much more comfortable in the sea. At the moment he looked very much like a fish out of water, but much stiller.

The brunette shakes his head, but Hyunjin doesn’t miss the brief hesitation, and he stands up. “Let’s go swimming,” he declares. “And then we can order takeout for breakfast so that Chan hyung doesn’t need to wake up and cook for us.”

“Swimming?” Felix suddenly perks up and turns to look at them. “Count me in!”

“No, you should let them go on their date, Lix hyung,” Jeongin calls out cheekily and Hyunjin puffs out his cheeks childishly.

“Lix can come if he wants! It’s not a date!”

“Sweet! Hyung, order us some breakfast,” Felix orders, turning to look at Changbin who rolls his eyes at the bossy attitude. Hyunjin smirks slightly when he catches the fondness in Changbin’s gaze that Felix seems to miss entirely.

“Sure. But I’m not swimming,” he decides.

Felix pokes his tongue out at the shorter man. “Fine, be that way.”

“Real mature, Lix,” Changbin retorts.

“ _ Anyway,  _ if you’re done flirting—”

“We’re not flirting!” Felix yelps and Jeongin just looks as though he’s having a field day, the widest grin on his face.

“Suuuure,” Hyunjin teases. “Anyway. I’m heading out for a swim.” He bolts off the couch and darts into the bedroom, swapping his pants for his swim trunks before darting out of the door and towards the beach, leaving the rest of them staring at his back.

“...is his inner swim-otaku coming out again?” Felix wonders aloud.

“Swim-otaku?” Seungmin repeats, turning to eye the blonde curiously.

Felix grins. “You know, when he goes gay for water.”

“No, I don't know,” Seungmin deadpans, but when he watches Hyunjin throw off his shirt and dart into the water like an excited child, he can't help but chuckle. “He's very bizarre.”

“Bizarre as in plain weird or kind of cute?” Jeongin breaks in, looking far more interested than he normally would have.

“Neither. Just...bizarre. You're all very bizarre.”

“We could say the same for you,” Changbin points out as he pockets his phone. “I ordered chicken. If you're all going to be out swimming, then you'll probably be starving after.”

“Great! Now that that's over with, let's go.” Felix runs to the bedroom to change into his swimming clothes.

When he's gone, Seungmin turns to face Changbin. “You're tense.”

“Yeah, I know. Maybe it's because of you,” Changbin admits honestly. “I don't know you, and suddenly you're integrated here. It feels off. Not to mention this whole siren thing. And we don't even know your intentions.”

Seungmin shrugs. “I'm not too happy about being here myself, but…” his eyes darken slightly. “I think I need to.” He stands up as Felix emerges from the bedroom wearing a wetsuit and a bright grin.

“Sea, here I come!” He cheers, running out of the building. Seungmin watches him go before following in his wake, Jeongin close behind, and finally, Changbin after a few moments of watching them.

Felix exhibits no hesitation as he runs into the water, splashing Hyunjin and perpetrating the resulting waterfight that Jeongin easily joins just so he could saturate the two with his ever-present grin on his face. Truth be told, it was slightly intimidating, how his smile was plastered on so perpetually. Seungmin just watches in fascination for a few minutes before tugging off his hoodie, and then his shirt, and finally, his sweats so that he's nearly stark naked, save for his chains and jewels that he never seemed to go anywhere without.

“Damn, Hyunjin was right, you do have a good physique,” Changbin remarks, sparing him a brief glance before looking away again, seemingly unfazed.

“I'd say I'm fairly average,” Seungmin disagrees as he lifts himself onto his feet and steps over to the shoreline, his frame glittering in the sunlight. He gravitates naturally to the turquoise waves, easily slipping from the shallows into deeper water and watching the sun dance through the surface to shine beneath in dim rays. He felt far more at home under the water than he did on land.

Seungmin just stays beneath the surface for a long while, letting the water flow through his gills and relaxing in the familiar environment when he's suddenly met with a familiar face. His eyes widen. “Hyunjin?” He exclaims, surprised, before immediately moving to clamp his hand over the other man's mouth before Hyunjin can make the stupid mistake of opening it. (Hyunjin would've argued that he wouldn't have, but Seungmin wouldn't believe him).

Hyunjin pulls away from his grip and breaks the surface, presumably to breathe, before ducking under again and looking at him. Seungmin meets his gaze incredulously because he's fairly certain that Hyunjin's eyes must have burned, but the man seemed all too eager to revisit the sensation for whatever reason. He purses his lips. “You're ridiculous,” he sighs, shaking his head and swimming beneath Hyunjin before sidling closer to him.

Under the water, it took him less effort to move. He could manoeuvre with grace and ease, and he was one with the currents. His chains float about him and as sunrays reflects off the adornments, it bathes him in fractals of dancing light. To say the least, Hyunjin looked enraptured, and although it was easy for Seungmin to see, he did his best to ignore it.

Hyunjin reaches out slowly, as though to touch him, but pulls back at the last moment and just smiles a little, averting his eyes. His frame glowed in the muted, refracting sunlight and his hair swayed with the movements of the water, forming a halo about his head. Hyunjin glances up at him again before swimming back to the surface, leaving Seungmin watching his trail. He closes his eyes momentarily and wonders to himself since when had humans been so beautiful. The thought clouds his mind and his eyes snap open, his brow furrowing. He scowls and breaks the surface, slicking his drenched hair back with a hand.

“I keep forgetting that you live underwater and I don't,” Hyunjin huffs, paddling around absently.

“How do you forget that you don’t live underwater?” Seungmin drawls, cocking an eyebrow at him. Hyunjin shrugs.

Hyunjin stares at him for a few moments, looking for all the world like he wanted to say something, but this time he had unfortunately developed something similar to a brain-to-mouth filter that functioned well enough for him to not spill exactly what was on his mind.

What had been going through Hyunjin’s mind was, in fact, the thought that Seungmin made him forget a lot of things, no matter how obvious they were. The boy had made him forget how to breathe multiple times, and even now, he had looked so completely and utterly  _ ethereal  _ in his element under the water that Hyunjin had temporarily forgotten that they even were underwater. Of course he had to be reminded painfully when his lungs screamed for air and he needed to swim back to the surface.

He debates on what he should say to Seungmin, finally able to think with enough sense to tell him that he shouldn’t just blurt out the first thing that came to mind like he had numerous times before, but before he has the chance to finally speak, he hears a loud yell somewhere in the distance.

His head whips around to see Felix flailing about a little further away from shore than they were and quite a distance away. The blonde was very obviously struggling, which made little sense to Hyunjin, as Felix was an excellent swimmer, albeit not as good as he himself was. He’s about to call out to see if Felix was all right before Seungmin tenses. “He needs help,” the brunette immediately gasps as Felix goes under.

Hyunjin’s body tenses as he finds himself rooted to the spot, watching as Felix breaks the surface, arms flailing, only to fall under the waves again. He finally manages to snap out of it a moment after Seungmin darts under the water again and he himself swims towards Felix. However, both of them aren’t as fast as Changbin despite the shorter man being seated by the shore watching them.

He had been the first to move, immediately sensing something was wrong the moment Felix had ceased to move, considering the boy never did that, especially not when he was in a hyperactive mood. And so Hyunjin watches as Changbin ducks underwater where Felix had disappeared.

Seungmin is under the water as well, but Hyunjin can only watch, stupefied, as the distorted form of Seungmin’s body darts out towards the mouth of the cove while Changbin drags Felix up to the surface. Only then does he finally move and help the man pull the blonde to the shore. His brow creases and his breaths catch. First Seungmin, then Chan, and now Felix. Something was very wrong.

Before he has the chance to move to check on Felix, who currently looked quite limp and awfully pale, Changbin takes the initiative, checking on him, taking his pulse and checking his breathing; he clearly was in a bad state. Hyunjin’s attention is immediately stolen to the sea again when he recalls that Jeongin had also been in the water, concerned that something may have happened to him as well.

To his relief, he sees both Seungmin and Jeongin making their way back to the shore.

“Shit, he’s not breathing,” Changbin hisses under his breath and Hyunjin tenses, turning back to where the man was bent over Felix, his clothes that weren’t fit for swimming plastered to his frame and a wild look in his eyes, almost like some kind of animal that had been cornered.

Hyunjin is about to push in and take over, but before he can, Changbin tilts Felix’s head back and pinches his nose before sealing his mouth over the blonde’s and blowing air into his lungs. Release, rinse, repeat. Hyunjin can only stare, his breaths taut in his chest as he waits for Felix to do something, anything. Hell, the young man could even come to and promptly tease him about Seungmin and he would be happy. Seeing Felix so small and unconscious felt wrong.

When Felix’s chest finally begins to rise and fall, Changbin moves back and stares at him, and Hyunjin stares at Changbin. There were few times that Hyunjin ever saw genuine fear in the man’s eyes, his fearful expressions often brief and overdramatized, but this time he knew that Changbin was afraid. He glances back at Felix when the blonde coughs harshly and spits water out onto the sand, tears welling up in his eyes and spilling down his cheeks. Again, Hyunjin is too slow to react, as Changbin is the first to dart forward, helping the blonde to sit himself upright and leaning Felix’s head against his chest.

“Hyung— hyung..!” Felix bursts into raspy tears, hiding his face in Changbins chest and reaching up to cling to his soaking wet shirt. Despite his deep voice, he still sounded incredibly small, and Hyunjin feels his heart sink with dread at the sight of the blonde clinging to Changbin as though he were some kind of lifeline.

“Shhh...it’s okay, Lixie, you’re safe now,” Changbin murmurs, his grip around the blonde’s back tightening protectively while his other hand rests in Felix’s saturated, stringy, blonde hair. Felix sniffles and keeps his face hidden for a while, pressing as close to the older male as he could. For a few minutes, Felix remains relatively still against the man while Jeongin ran off to fetch a towel for him.

Hyunjin’s eyes widen when Felix finally lifts his head, his eyes reddened and looking absolutely terrified in a way that Hyunjin had never before seen from him. The blonde’s gaze meets Changbin’s and his hand balls into a tight fist, taking with it Changbin’s saturated t-shirt.

“They— they were pulling me down, hyung,” Felix rasps fresh tears blooming in his eyes as his voice cracks. “They w-were...they were trying to drown m-me..”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're more than halfway there now!  
> Thank you for reading, I'll see you in the next chapter <3


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we've hit 2k+ hits, thank you to everyone who took the time to read this fic, and I'm so glad so many of you are enjoying it! it's been fun to write and it's nearing its end now, but thank you all for sticking with me~

Felix had been wrapped in a towel by Jeongin and carried back to the bungalow by Changbin, straight into Chan’s waiting arms. Hyunjin had learned to never question the man’s mum-senses, so he wasn’t all too surprised to see him spontaneously awake and very ready for Felix, having a foot bath and some warm tea already made for him.

Seungmin on the other hand hadn’t spoken a single word as he had dressed himself in the clothing Hyunjin had bought for him, his eyes drifting intermittently between Felix and the sea. Hyunjin wished he could tell what the man was thinking; his expression was more or less blank and gave away nothing. Hyunjin did, however note the dark look in Seungmin’s eyes, and honestly it had intimidated him to the point where he had just clung to Jeongin the entire time. The younger looked understandably shaken, and Hyunjin didn’t blame him at all. He himself was having second thoughts about setting foot in the water again. Twice in the span of two days and not within a long time from each other was too coincidental.

Hyunjin found that Felix was loath to let go of Changbin now, just as much as Changbin was loath to leave his side. Under any other circumstance, Hyunjin may have teased them for it or found it cute, but it wasn’t in the slightest. Not when Felix looked out of the window with naked fear in his eyes. Hyunjin needed to know what had happened.

“Lix, do you think you can tell us what you remember?” he asks gently after Chan helps the blonde sip some of the tea. Jeongin is still stuck to his side and watching Felix quietly, his smile once again disintegrating.

At the question, Felix flinches and his eyes well with tears again, and Hyunjin immediately feels guilty for asking him too soon. Changbin pulls up a corner of the towel wrapped around Felix and dabs at the man’s eyes. “Lixie, if you can’t say it, then you don’t need to,” he assures, his voice a low, soothing rumble.

Felix sniffles and shakes his head. “N-no, I need to say it or it’ll..” he drifts off and sobs, pulling his knees to his chest. Chan rubs his back gently but firmly, concern shining clearly in his eyes. Felix takes a few moments before lifting his head again. “I..I was just playing around and I w-wanted to swim where it was deeper, so I did…” He pauses and sniffles, wiping his eyes. “And th-then I felt s-something grab m-my ankle.."

He stops and buries his face in his knees again, and this time Changbin leans over to plant a kiss on the top of his head in a small but comforting gesture. He leans against the shorter man, his muted crying sounding more like whimpers than anything else. In that moment, Hyunjin felt a protective kind of anger course over him. Felix was his best friend, had been ever since they had met nearly a decade ago in middle school. No one was allowed to hurt him, or at least not without vehement retribution from Hyunjin. Felix was someone that he resolved to take care of because that was just who Felix was. Someone that Hyunjin wanted and needed to protect.

Felix lifts his head again after a few minutes, staring down at his knees. “It..it pulled me down, and I t-tried to swim back up, and th-then it pulled me down again and something g-grabbed my shoulders and k-kept me under— I panicked and...and I swear I s-saw th-these…” he buries his face in his hands. “I couldn’t see clearly...they...they had t-tails like sharks and...and pointed teeth...and their eyes—” he shudders. “Eyes like...cats and— and th-they were black and not white and—” Felix curls in on himself.

“Hey, Lixie, it’s okay, you’re with us, you’re on land, you’re safe,” Changbin tells him, wrapping an arm around him.

Seungmin suddenly rises to his feet from where he had been sitting silently beside Hyunjin and Jeongin. “Stay indoors,” he states. “Don’t go outside today.” His gaze is dark and somewhat shadowed by his fringe as his head is slightly bowed. He doesn’t meet any of their eyes. “No, more than that, don’t go outside until I say so.”

“Why not?” Changbin suddenly challenges, sitting up straight and moving his arm away from Felix.

Seungmin meets his eyes coolly. “Because I know who’s behind this, and until it’s resolved, none of you are safe. Do not leave this building.”

He turns and steps out of the bungalow, stepping towards the shore. Hyunjin watches him go and frowns. He couldn’t help but find it unfair that Seungmin wasn’t telling them anything. They were up to their necks in the issue just as much as he was, and Hyunjin wasn’t just going to sit back and allow everything to happen to his friends without at least knowing what was going on.

“...I’m going after him,” he decides aloud.

Chan immediately raises a hand to stop him. “Are you sure that’s a good idea? He seems...more reliable in this case, Jin.”

Hyunjin turns to appeal to him. “Hyung, I want to know what’s going on. Don’t say you’re okay with being left out of the loop. You almost drowned last night and now Lix…”

The older man sighs, cracking his knuckles absently. “My first priority isn’t knowing everything, my first priority is making sure all of you are safe. I’m not risking any of you getting hurt after this. Of course I want to know, but that’s not as important to me as making sure that this doesn’t happen again.”

Hyunjin frowns and looks down. “Hyung, I’m a good swimmer. And I have Seungmin, I trust him.” He rises to his feet. “I need to know what’s going on. Let me go.” He understood Chan’s concern, but he wasn’t going to let it stop him. In the moments of silence that succeed his request, he can practically hear the debate in Chan’s mind.

“Come back as soon as possible,” Chan finally states, and Hyunjin nods, turning and bolting through the door and towards Seungmin.

Before he can even draw close to the siren, Seungmin whirls around and stares at him flatly, a clearly displeased look in his eyes. “Didn’t I tell you to stay inside?” he asks him bluntly.

Hyunjin only stubbornly meets his gaze. “You owe me one for saving your life, remember? I’m using that favour now. You’re gonna let me find out what happened.”

The brunette opens his mouth to argue, but after a few moments of no words eliciting from his lips, he finally shuts it and sighs, shaking his head. “Fine, but consider us even after that.” Hyunjin didn’t know the implications behind his words, neither did he want to, but he nods firmly.

“Deal.”

Seungmin continues to walk and Hyunjin follows him, even when he sheds his clothes and slips into the water. Hyunjin swims out with him, following him through the cove and closer to the sea, but still nearby the rocks. When Seungmin pulls himself lithely onto one of the protruding crags, Hyunjin follows him. He sits meekly behind him as Seungmin kneels against the cool surface and stares out at the open water, his eyes taking on a silvery tint as he begins to sing.

Now probably wasn’t the right time to be captivated, but Hyunjin really couldn’t help himself. It just happened every single time Seungmin opened his mouth to sing, something ethereal, as though time itself slowed to listen to the young man's voice. And Hyunjin was of the opinion that, although Seungmin was undeniably handsome regardless of time of day or situation, he was most beautiful when he sang, his eyes burning with a kind of passion, as though it was more than just something that he did, more than a byproduct of what he was. And Hyunjin couldn't help but fall for it, fall for Seungmin.

However, this time his song is demanding, commanding, a cry that echoed like a rallying alarm, and although Hyunjin doesn't understand a word of what he's saying, he realizes that Seungmin must be calling for someone.

And they do come, slinking through the current like sea serpents, sometimes leaping out entirely like dolphins, all with the selfsame grace with which Seungmin himself would swim. They too had gills at their necks as well as their jaws, and the only striking difference were the tails. Stemming from their lower backs and stretching out intimidatingly were the almost leathery appendages.

 

_Tails like sharks._

 

The first had his dorsal fin at the small of his back, his tail a consistent, beautiful grey colour with a slightly whiter underbelly. The dorsal fin of the second was slightly higher on his back, his tailskin a more earthen, almost bronze hue and more slender than that of the first. The third had more fins than the other two, with a first and second dorsal and pelvic fins. His tail was spotted in browns, much like a leopard and quite beautiful in Hyunjin's opinion, or so he would've thought were he not a little afraid for his life.

Hyunjin tenses as the three figures pull themselves up and onto the crag upon which he and Seungmin sat with an ease that sent an impressive ripple through their toned frames. He looks over them.

 

_Eyes like cats. Instead of having whites, they were black._

 

Just as Felix had mentioned, all three sported very catlike eyes, pupils slits as opposed to round, and as disturbing as Hyunjin found it, the whites of their eyes were indeed black. He shudders despite himself. The leopard-tailed man's green eyes were cattish, sharply tapered and his lashes were long. He had an attractive face, that Hyunjin couldn't deny, but he preferred Seungmin's. The bronze-tailed man's piercing gaze was a pale, steel-blue that made his rather softly shaped face seem more fierce than it really was. However, it's the last man that catches Hyunjin's attention the most. The grey-tailed man with a sharp facial bone structure sported a pair of striking golden eyes that he immediately recognizes and his lips part in a gasp.

“Y-you're the one that nearly drowned Chan hyung!” He accuses, his finger raising to point at the golden-eyed man. He's met with an unreadable stare (four of them) and he shrinks slightly under the attention.

“You brought a human with you, Seungminnie?” The golden-eyed man voices, and Hyunjin is shocked by how warm his voice sounded. In retrospect, he shouldn't have been surprised by the fact that the man had an attractive voice, but in the moment he was.

Seungmin just frowns and nods. “I'll explain—”

“Seungminnie, you've been gone so long, we miss you,” the leopard-tailed man croons, reaching out to pinch Seungmin's cheek only to have the brunette bat his hand away. Hyunjin is somewhat surprised to see such a response from the typically courteous Seungmin, but the man doesn't seem so unused to it. In response, the man only grins.

 

_Pointed teeth._

 

Now as Hyunjin may or may not have mentioned before, he did not do horror. And he was very much horrified at this point because no matter how attractive these three shark boys—whatever they were—were, they were also very intimidating and Hyunjin was very intimidated, thank you very much.

“Why is there a human here?” The golden-eyed man asks again and Hyunjin frowns, not wanting to meet eyes with any of them. They honestly looked like they could actually eat him, and he wasn't too eager to find out if they really could.

“I made a promise, but that's not important right now,” Seungmin responds bluntly. “I really didn’t want to believe it, but you’ve been trying to kill the human and his friends.” Seungmin’s eyes narrow. “And I want to know why.” Hyunjin shrinks back slightly when the three turn to stare at him again in silence, neither affirming or denying Seungmin’s statements.

“The better question is why you’re so concerned,” the bronze-tailed boy with the slightly puffy cheeks finally speaks up, his voice reminding Hyunjin vaguely of those old church bells for whatever odd reason. As though it was more accustomed to sounding amicable and welcoming, but in this case sounded foreboding and uneasily dark.

Seungmin brow knits and Hyunjin takes the opportunity to observe him because he’s never seen the brunette so...emotional. It felt strange to see him in an element where he was raw, where he didn’t seem so out of anyone’s league. It was strange to see him in a situation where it was almost as though Seungmin didn’t know what to do.

“Maybe because it’s _murder_?” Seungmin stresses. “Murder isn’t like you. Any of you.”

The golden-eyed man closes his eyes momentarily, breathing out a sigh. “Seungminnie. They’re humans,” he tells him, as though the simple statement would justify what he was practically admitting to, considering he hadn’t denied the accusation at all.

Hyunjin can’t listen to it. “Okay, we’re humans,” he interjects. “Okay, so humans can be pretty horrible, but why are you trying to kill my friends?” he asks, his brow knitted into an indignant scowl. “We’ve done nothing to you!”

His outburst seems to surprise them, but he doesn’t take his words back even when the three pairs of catlike eyes turn to fixate him on the spot. Seungmin is fiddling with what seemed to be a sapphire that hung on his thigh, an unreadable look in his eyes. The boy only speaks after a few moments of silence. “He’s right. They haven’t done anything wrong.”

The leopard-tailed young man sits up a little straighter on the rocks, his tail whipping around powerfully, stopping just mere inches away from where it could’ve knocked Hyunjin off of the crag and into the water with ease, and maybe snapped his spine while it was at it. “Seungminnie, remember what humans did to you?” he asks forthrightly. “Why defend them?”

Hyunjin pauses and turns to stare at the green-eyed man. “What humans did to him..?” he echoes slowly. His head shifts so that he could eye Seungmin who looked terribly uncomfortable and perhaps even upset, and Hyunjin finds that he wants to comfort the brunette although he doesn’t know what’s going on. He cautiously inches closer to Seungmin and reaches out to touch the hand that was resting on his thigh, just allowing his hand to cover Seungmin’s.

The brunette’s gaze shoots up to meet his, surprised, but he only offers him a somewhat awkward but still sweet smile. “Hey, Minnie, it’s okay,” he tells him softly, the nickname just slipping out naturally. He doesn’t have the grace to feel flustered in this moment, however. “You don’t have to tell me anything...but just know that not all humans are terrible. A lot of them care. A lot.”

“Seungmin isn’t like us,” the bronze-tailed boy states suddenly, raking his fingers through his drenched, navy hair. His cold, steel-blue eyes fixate themselves on Hyunjin. “He’s human.”

And Hyunjin short-circuits at that, whipping around to face the man with wide eyes. Seungmin’s gaze slacks into a deadpan but somehow intimidating glare that he fixes on him. “Jisung!”

“If you want your explanation, the truth is going to come out in whole,” the golden-eyed man sighs, sounding almost remorseful. “Yes, there are things we’ve hidden from you, but it was for your own good. It was better if you didn’t know. We all agreed to keep it from you because you didn’t need to know. You were living just fine with us.”

Seungmin’s lips part as though he wanted to speak, but after a few moments, he just shuts his mouth and looks down, not meeting any of their eyes. Hyunjin’s hand shifts to clasp his and he glances over at him in surprise. Hyunjin only squeezes his hand gently. “I’m here.” It was a feeble attempt at comfort, but it made Seungmin smile faintly.

“What do you know about yourself?” the leopard-tailed man asks Seungmin moving his tail away from Hyunjin once he deems that the man wouldn’t be a threat of any sort to them.

Seungmin draws in a slow breath, and Hyunjin squeezes his hand again. To Hyunjin’s surprise, Seungmin does the same in return. “I know that I was born human. I know that my parents didn’t want me so they threw me into the sea while they were on a cruise. And I know that you all saved me,” Seungmin recites almost robotically.

And suddenly Hyunjin feels a burning and somewhat terrifying wrath boiling in his gut when he hears Seungmin speak that outweighed the shock of hearing that Seungmin was, in fact, a human...to some extent. He didn’t know how any parent could not merely abandon their child, but actually attempt filicide. The fact that it had been someone like Seungmin, someone that Hyunjin adored with all his heart (he had given up on even denying it at this point) made him all the more livid. He closes his eyes and breathes slowly so that he doesn’t say or do anything stupid. Seungmin didn’t need that now, he needed support. Hyunjin’s grip on Seungmin’s hand tightens slightly.

“Do you know how we saved you?” bronze-tailed boy (Jisung?) asks next.

Seungmin nods. “You used your magic to give me my gills.”

The golden-eyed man picks at a barnacle attached to his tail and meets Seungmin’s eyes. “That’s where the secrets come in,” he states. “We aren’t like the sirens of old, our power is limited and we aren’t strong enough to harness any major spell without a catalyst.” His gaze darkens and Hyunjin resists the urge to flinch again because it was very, very intimidating. “Yes, we tore the gills into your neck, but that wasn’t enough to let you live where we did.”

Hyunjin does flinch despite himself, but really, who wouldn’t? His gaze darts over to the overlapping folds of skin on Seungmin’s neck: apparently his gills that had been _torn_ into his neck. That just sounded plain painful.

“The catalyst we used was the darkness that was hidden in your heart,” the man continues simply, his voice still warm despite the regret that it was riddled with. “Even as a child you understood what it was to be surrounded by that kind of darkness and _rage._ It was strong enough to give you the capacity and subconscious willpower to use the gills we had given you to breathe. It was too strong.”

The leopard-tailed man rests a hand on the shoulder of the other, who seemed rather distressed by now, and picks up for him. “It was too strong to the point where it consumed us,” he relates slowly, his gaze serious. “To feel that same wrath that you felt. To take it out as an act of justice. You weren’t aware of it, but our hands are already guilty. You’ve never had the chance to encounter another human because we’ve killed any that have come close to approaching you.”

Hyunjin tenses.

“We weren’t fast enough this time,” the navy-haired boy interjects, his glowing, steel-blue eyes shifting to rest on Hyunjin intently. “You escaped Woojin once and Minho and I again today.”

“You can’t evade us forever,” the leopard-tailed boy, Minho, croons, and it frightens Hyunjin, how the menace in his sweet voice doesn’t match the dead look in his eyes, but he’s beginning to understand that maybe, just maybe, they had no choice. “You can’t come near our Seungminnie. We’ll kill you.”

 

“No.”

 

The three sirens turn to eye Seungmin, who had released Hyunjin’s hand. His fingers were curled into fists on his thighs, and his gaze was plastered to the surface of the crag, but his voice was firm. “The reason Woojin failed last night was because I saved him. The man you tried to kill.”

Jisung’s eyes widen slightly. “You— why?” he asks, his voice clearly shocked.

“Because he didn’t deserve to die!” Seungmin responds as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. “When they brought him in to rest and I went to check if he was all right and to confirm my suspicions that you may have been behind it, the first thing he did was worry about being hospitable to me even though he had nearly drowned minutes before!!” Seungmin shakes his head. “I can’t let you kill any of them.”

“We’re sorry, Seungminnie,” Minho states, a remorseful glint in his eyes. “We have no choice. We can’t allow humans to hurt you again. We need to kill them.”

“Do you really think you’re doing me a favour?” Seungmin snaps, his head rising stiffly, his dark eyes shining a bright silver. “Do you think that I appreciate the fact that you want to kill— that you _have_ killed people for me?”

“Do you think we _want_ to kill humans?” Jisung finally asks, his voice rising slightly. “The oceans are big enough for all of us. We’d be fine avoiding them! Don’t you see, Min? We have to kill them because of your hatred for them! It was your darkness that cursed us!”

And at that, Seungmin falls suddenly silent. Woojin stares at Jisung his lips pursed into a frown. “Jisung...there was no need to be so harsh,” he tells him softly.

“No, he’s right, isn’t he,” Seungmin mutters softly, his fingers twitching. “This isn’t your fault, it’s my fault..”

“Min, that’s not what I meant—”

“Doesn’t make it any less true, Sung,” Seungmin murmurs. He lifts himself onto his feet. “I need to think.” And with that, he leaps off of the rock, diving down into the darker water and disappearing from Hyunjin’s range of sight, also leaving Hyunjin with three sirens who had openly admitted that they wanted to kill Hyunjin and his friends, and honestly, he didn’t know how to feel about that.

Slowly, he turns to look at the three only to find them looking at him again and he flinches. “Um...can you not kill me right now?” he asks lamely. “Seungmin’s probably going through a lot right now and I’d like to be alive so that I can be there for him. So...yeah.”

“What’s your name?” Woojin asks him simply, completely disregarding his blatant and probably immensely imbecilic request.

“Hwang Hyunjin.”

“Well, Hwang Hyunjin, I’m sorry, but you won’t be leaving this place alive,” Jisung tells him bluntly.

“Yeah...I kinda got that after the multiple death threats,” Hyunjin responds just as dryly. His brow furrows. “Do you guys really have to kill us? Isn’t there any way to..you know, _not_ kill us?”

“We have no control over our minds when we see a human close to our Seungminnie,” Minho admits. “We can only feel the urge to kill. We feel the urge to protect him. It’s what we’ve been doing ever since he came under our care.”

Hyunjin looks down at himself. “Why am I not dead yet, then?” he asks, genuinely confused. “Not that I want to be dead or anything, but using that logic—”

“I don’t know,” Woojin interjects, and Hyunjin swears that the concern in his voice just feels so oddly familiar. “Around you, the urge lessens. Of course it’s still there, but we have enough control over it to control ourselves. Or at least I do, but I’ll assume that’s the same for Jisung and Minho.” He glances over at the pair and they nod. He then turns to face Hyunjin again. “I don’t think we’ve ever encountered a human like that before.

Hyunjin didn’t know why that was either, but boy was he glad that that was the case or he may just be drifting down to his watery grave by now.

He peers off the rock and into the azure water where he still can’t see Seungmin because of how deep the brunette had swum. He frowns. “Seungmin?” he calls slowly, his voice tentative and hesitant, as though unsure of whether the boy would actually listen to him. He didn’t doubt that Seungmin would be able to hear him though, considering how the brunette had heard him many times before. After a few moments, the water swells and Seungmin pops up above the surface, just to his shoulders, eyeing Hyunjin blankly. Hyunjin offers him a slight smile. “Let’s go back soon or Chan hyung will start worrying.”

Seungmin had absolutely no reason to say yes to him. He was under no obligation to go back and Hyunjin should have realized that, but despite the thoughts that had escaped Hyunjin’s radar, Seungmin only nods. “Let’s go,” he states, raising a hand to beckon Hyunjin to join him in the water, and after a moment’s hesitation, Hyunjin dives neatly off of the crag and into the water with him.

As Seungmin ducks beneath the water and swims off gracefully, Hyunjin follows him, oblivious to the stares of surprise that follow his back from the crag whereupon he had been resting just moments before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's almost there, just a little more... thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed it, and i'll see you next chapter! <3


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i just want to attack every single reader who dropped a kudos or comment with all the hearts because you're all so nice and cute and i love you guys? thank you again for all the support that you all always give, you're literally the sweetest people ever <333

“Hey, Jin, is Seungmin all right?” Hyunjin glances up from where he had been staring blankly at Changbin and Felix being grossly inseparable, eating junk food and binging some tv show. He supposes that Minho and Jisung had actually done the pair a favour (even if it was through nearly drowning Felix), but he's just surprised that he can't tease them about it. He feels strangely hollow. It must've shown on his face when he looks up at Chan because the next thing the man asks him is, “Are _you_ all right?”

“Me? Yeah, I'm fine, hyung,” he responds, virtually on autopilot. Seungmin, on the other hand, had retreated to the bedroom the moment they had returned and hadn't set foot out of it since. Hyunjin decided that allowing him his privacy would be a wise idea, but he was a little worried.

Chan sighs and reaches down to mess with his hair. “Hey, there's some chicken left from what you guys ordered this morning. You and Seungmin haven't eaten yet.” He pops back into the kitchen and returns with a plate of the warmed chicken, which he pushes into Hyunjin's hands. “Go see if he's all right,” the man tells him, and to say the least, he doesn't need to be told twice.

No one had questioned what had occurred when they had been outside, for which Hyunjin was grateful for. He didn't know if he could properly articulate all that he had witnessed and heard just yet. He carries the plate over to the bedroom and slowly opens the door. “Seungmin?” He calls.

His eyes fall on the bed, and he's surprised to find the boy fully clothed, considering Seungmin's natural aversion to clothes in general. He moves over to the bed and sets the chicken on the side table before sitting down with Seungmin, who had his knees pulled to his chest and his chin resting on them.

“Hyunjin,” the brunette greets simply.

Hyunjin smiles faintly, a brief little thing, and settles down beside Seungmin, pulling his knees to his chest as well and just sitting there quietly with him. For a few moments, he only sits there, not yet attempting to make any conversation.

“Why're you here?” Seungmin finally breaks the silence, sparing him a glance.

Hyunjin shrugs. “I mean we did rent out the place, so I like to think I can go wherever I want in it,” he responds, earning himself a raised eyebrow and a familiar but not unwelcome unimpressed look. He chuckles. “There's the Seungmin I know.” His words cause the brunette to frown and look away, making him wonder if he had said the wrong thing. He pouts slightly. “Minnie, what's on your mind?” He asks him gently.

“Nothing much.”

“That's a lie.”

“We all lie, what's one more?”

Hyunjin huffs softly. “One more lie still hides one more truth,” he replies before finally turning to face Seungmin. “Are you feeling all right?” he asks worriedly. He pouts a little. “What am I saying, of course it’s not all right. You’re probably really upset.”

“I’m not, I’m fine,” Seungmin insists softly, still not looking at him.

Hyunjin shifts closer to him and takes his hand loosely in his own, and although it’s as cold as it normally is, Hyunjin feels warm just touching it. He watches Seungmin carefully and chuckles slightly. “You know it’s all right to not feel okay sometimes, right?” he tells him. “Sometimes things are just hard to deal with alone. That’s why you have people there, so you can turn to them when you need to.” He squeezes Seungmin’s hand. “And you know, no matter how upset or confused you are about everything, I’m glad it happened this way.”

Seungmin finally lifts his head to stare at him, bemused. Hyunjin’s smile turns a little rueful. “Call me selfish or whatever you want, but if it wasn’t for that darkness in your heart or whatever your friends called it, you would be dead by now, and if you were dead, then I would’ve never met you, and as much as you cause all my heart problems, I’m really glad that I met you.”

When Seungmin doesn’t say anything, Hyunjin feels the blood creep up to his cheeks again and he wonders if he’s made a fool of himself yet again, although by this point, he really couldn’t be bothered, seeing as he had already played the fool so many times in front of Seungmin that one more couldn’t possibly make the brunette think any lower of him...actually, perhaps it could, but again, Hyunjin couldn’t be bothered. He clears his throat and moves his hand away from Seungmin’s reaching over to take the plate of chicken that he had brought with him. “Anyway, Chan hyung told us to eat. Besides, eating helps you think better,” he announces, as though he had control over this situation.

When Seungmin’s gaze turns judgmental again, Hyunjin just laughs and takes a chicken leg, prodding Seungmin’s lips with it until the boy just snatches it from him with a disgruntled expression and bites into it. When his eyes widen in that familiar way that they had when he had drunk purified water for the first time, Hyunjin realizes that Seungmin must have never eaten chicken before.

He giggles when Seungmin devours the rest of the leg, but stops him when he tries to bite down on the bone, covering his laugh with a hand. “You don’t eat the bones, Seungminnie,” he hums, plucking it out of the brunette’s grip and setting it aside, his eyes curving and crinkles forming at their edges with how widely he was smiling.

For the first time, he sees the boy’s ears turn slightly pink and he coos. “Eat more,” he insists, holding the plate out to the boy. This time, Seungmin doesn’t hesitate to take one. When Hyunjin assures himself that Seungmin is going to eat properly, he finally takes some for himself.

They eat in relative silence, and if Hyunjin were with any of his other friends, the silence would have seemed stifling. He couldn’t live without Felix being the rowdy person he was or someone laughing boisterously during any of their meals, but with Seungmin, the silence felt normal. Comfortable. Hyunjin didn’t mind it; it felt right.

He feels a little less heavy-hearted when he takes the empty plate back to the kitchen and tosses the bones in the trash. Because he feels extra nice at the moment, he takes the plate to the sink so he can wash it, and while he’s caught up his world of warm water and suds, he feels someone grab his shoulder. He shrieks, his knees giving out on him.

Jeongin catches him before he can tumble onto the tiles and break the dish in his hands and potentially hurt himself too (the former being more important than the latter of course) and sets him back upright. “Hyung, you’re sad,” the youngest sighs in mock-disappointment, making a show of pinching the bridge of his nose and shaking his head slowly.

Hyunjin pouts. “I wasn’t expecting that, okay, for all I know you wanted to give me premeditated cardiac arrest, Innie.”

“I need to start being less obvious then,” Jeongin remarks with a pout of his own, looping his arms around Hyunjin’s waist and resting his chin on his shoulder. Hyunjin dries his plate and pads off to keep it in the cabinet, Jeongin waddling along with him. He glances back and bumps his temple against the younger’s forehead with a grin.

“Maybe you do,” he agrees and pecks his temple because it was hard to not want to smother Jeongin in affection at any given time. It was the privilege of being the youngest and as much as Jeongin would deny it, everyone knew he loved the attention.

“Hey, hyung?” Jeongin asks after a moment of just waddling around the kitchen with him.

“Hm?”

“...don’t go anywhere, okay?”

Hyunjin glances back to find the fox-eyed boy staring at him intently, and he realizes that the past few days must have been frightening to him, although he was currently doing an exceptional job at hiding it. He contorts his arm so that he can mess with Jeongin’s hair, a grin on his face. “Hyung isn’t going anywhere,” he assures him, eventually moving away from his grip. “Go bug Chan hyung for a bit,” he tells him. “I need to go check on Seungmin.”

He should’ve realized he had said the wrong thing when Jeongin’s lips spread widely into a grin and he almost immediately releases him. “Check on him. Suuuure.” Jeongin traipses off, grin still plastered on his face as Hyunjin hollers a _“hey, what’s that supposed to mean?!”_ after him.

The man pouts and pads quietly back to his room, knocking on the door before opening it. He finds clothes folded up neatly on the bed, and when he sees Seungmin’s familiar skin, he feels relieved as opposed to awkward. What catches his eye next is what happens to be in Seungmin’s hands, and he shuts the door behind him and slides down it to sit on the floor, burying his face in his hands and trying desperately not to squeal.

Where on earth had Seungmin found his harp seal pup plushie?

The brunette had the little creature in his arms and currently looked very intrigued by it, pulling at the synthetic fur and poking it with a innocent gleam of curiosity in his eyes, and Hyunjin wanted to _sob_ , he was so cute.

“Hyunjin?” Seungmin glances up and stares at the man, currently curled up by the door, head in his hands, and looking rather depressed.

Hyunjin lifts his head and stares back at Seungmin before pouting. “It’s not fair!” he wails childishly. “It’s not fair, why are you so cute?”

Seungmin looks down at the harp seal pup plushie in his hands and then back up at Hyunjin. “I just saw this in your bag.” He pokes at it and Hyunjin stares at him, sparkly-eyed and all. “...real ones are cuter, but I don’t get to see them often since they live so far north.” Whether Seungmin had any reaction to Hyunjin’s _oh-so-subtle_ complaint, he couldn’t tell, but at least he wasn’t too weirded out.

Hyunjin picks himself up and makes his way over to the bed, sitting down with Seungmin again, cross-legged this time. He looks down at the harp seal pup plush and grins slightly. “I got it because it reminded me of you,” he finally admits, feeling himself redden.

“Reminded you of me?” Seungmin repeats, his eyebrows riding up in surprise, and Hyunjin has to wonder just why he’s so surprised.

Hyunjin grins again, poking the nose of the plush. “You know, when it yawns and its eyes crinkle and it’s mouth just opens wide…” his gaze softens fondly. “It’s like you when you smile.” Hyunjin takes the plush out of Seungmin’s hands and holds it up to his eye level, staring at it with such an adoring expression. “You have a very beautiful smile, Seungminnie.”

He only realizes how stupid he must look when he hears no response from Seungmin. He turns scarlet and hides his face in the plush. “I’m just making a fool of myself again, aren’t I…” he grumbles, giving up on trying to defend his stupid _feelings._

“You’re a bizarre man, Hyunjin.”

Hyunjin squeaks when Seungmin plucks the harp seal plush out of his hands and sets it aside, leaving him with no shield to hide behind. His lips fall into a natural pout at that because it was as though Seungmin was intentionally trying to make him suffer. He peeks up at Seungmin, but when he meets his almond doe-eyes he hides his face in his hands. “And you’re mean,” he huffs.

Despite how _attacked_ he was currently feeling, he was glad that Seungmin didn’t look quite so uncomfortable as he had before.

He eventually gathers himself enough to finally look up and turn to face the brunette again. “Do you feel better?” he asks him, deciding to be blunt because Seungmin tended to take bluntness better than beating around the bush...or at least experience told him so. Experience don’t fail him now.

“I...think so. I feel less overwhelmed. Thank you, Hyunjin.”

He tilts his head at Seungmin, confusion glimmering in his eyes. “Why thank me?”

This time it’s Seungmin’s turn to wear surprise on his face. He looks about to respond, but instead shakes his head. “It’s nothing,” he brushes off. “Just...thanks for being here.”

Hyunjin smiles warmly. “It hasn’t been easy for you. Being here is the least I could do.”

Seungmin draws in a breath. “You probably have a lot of questions about everything now that you’ve heard all that. Honestly, I do too—”

“I don’t.”

And again, surprise glints evidently in the brunette’s dark eyes. “You...don’t..?”

Hyunjin shakes his head firmly. “I know enough. And if I’m not supposed to know more, that’s fine. I know about you now. That’s enough for me.” He meets Seungmin’s gaze unwaveringly. “Seungmin, I’m not going to leave you alone.”

“Hyunjin, that’s unreasonable. You’re only here for your summer. You’ll have to leave eventually.”

Hyunjin shakes his head. “No— well, yeah, maybe I’ll have to _literally_ leave, but I’m not leaving you alone. Even if your friends are out to get me and my friends, I’m still grateful for them because they saved you. They’re there for you, sure, but I’m going to prove to you that humans aren’t all bad. I’m not going to be a human that leaves you.”

“If you’re going to do that just for the sake of doing that, you can forget about it,” Seungmin responds sharply, catching him off guard. Seungmin’s eyes are slightly wider than usual, captivating him. “Don’t waste your time. You’ll get yourself and your friends killed.”

For a few moments, Hyunjin is silent. Then he shrugs. “If we go down, we go down together. That’s just how friendship works, Seungmin. No one gets left behind. If one falls, the rest pick them up. As long as there’s one of us left standing, we can’t give up.”

“You can’t speak for your friends,” Seungmin insists.

This time, it’s Hyunjin that cocks an eyebrow at the brunette, and he smiles sliding from the mattress and rounding the bed, tossing Seungmin’s clothes at him. “Can’t I?” he chuckles. “Get changed, we need to tell them what happened.”

Seungmin still looks terribly befuddled, but at least he listens, throwing on his clothes with a relative ease, as though he’s a little more used to it now, although in Hyunjin’s opinion, nothing could beat the sight of Seungmin when he was in the water, On land his movements and steps were cutely clunky, but underwater, he moved with unparalleled grace. He takes Seungmin’s wrist when the brunette is fully clothed, and tugs him out into the living room, crashing loudly onto the empty sofa. “Gather ‘round, losers!” he yowls vociferously. “We’ve got some news for you.”

“You’re officially dating?” Jeongin calls, his head popping out of one of the rooms.

“You’re gonna admit that you two had coitus?” Felix adds, his head popping out from the same doorway, comically above Jeongin’s.

“Okay, first off, go screw yourself, Felicia...or get Binnie hyung to do it for you, and secondly, don’t ever use the term coitus in my presence again,” Hyunjin huffs. “And _no_ , we _are not_ dating, Innie.”

“I— what- no! I mean…maybe, but—” Felix sputters, his ears reddening, and Hyunjin smirks winningly at the realization that he finally has an upper hand against that devil-incarnate. The blonde pouts. “Hey, I was just asking an honest question, don’t be salty, Jin,” he huffs, pelting out of the room and sliding onto the couch opposite of him, Jeongin piling on top of Felix mere seconds later.

“What do you have to tell us?” Chan, somewhat the voice of reason, asks, leaving his room with Changbin following behind him with a raised eyebrow.

Hyunjin sits up a little straighter and looks over at Seungmin, who has his head bowed, hands on his knees, and expression unreadable. He then turns to look at Chan. “What’s going on and what we’re going to do about it,” he responds. He sees Changbin’s eyes harden slightly, and he doesn’t doubt that the man must be relieving the events of the morning.

He breathes out a sigh. “Long story short, Seungmin is a human that was abandoned to the sea by his parents, and some sirens saved him and used some kind of darkness in his heart to give him his gills so that he could live with them, but they ended up cursed because of it and now they’re kind of wired to kill any humans that come close to him…?” he summarizes. Seungmin doesn’t correct him, so he assumes he’s done that right at least.

After a few moments of the information being processed by his friends, both Changbin and Jeongin finally break the silence. “How are we supposed to react?” Changbin asks while Jeongin’s “Does this mean we’re all going to die?” rings alongside it.

Hyunjin notes that Felix has gone pale and he frowns, understanding that he must have been genuinely traumatized by what had happened. Felix had always been soft-hearted and gentle despite his incessant teasing and 2nd degree black-belt in taekwondo. It was probably one of the factors that made Hyunjin want to _fight_ anything that tried to do him any kind of harm. He shakes his head.

“No, Innie, we’re not going to die,” he states immediately.  “We know that we're being targeted now that we've met Seungmin and we know that it's not safe to be in the water, so I guess that means no more swimming for a bit..”

Chan frowns. “Wasn't the solution in the myths to plug your ears?” He suggests.

“That's all well and good, but we won't be able to hear each other either,” Changbin points out dryly.

His words are met with a shrug from the older man. “That doesn't sound too bad to me,” he replies simply and Jeongin laughs.

“No, that won't work,” Seungmin finally speaks up. “It's inconvenient and it won't stop you from becoming victims, especially you,” he gestures towards Chan, “because you've heard Woojin's voice already.”

“Woojin?” Chan echoes.

Seungmin nods. “He's the oldest. I'm not sure how old he is, but he's been here longer than the rest.”

“That was whose voice I heard?” Chan muses slowly.

“Yes. And you're better off not hearing it again.” Seungmin's eyes narrow slightly.

Hyunjin frowns. “Chan hyung, it's our turn to keep an eye on you,” he tells him outright. “You can't control yourself around his voice and you nearly drowned because of it. We'll watch you so that if you do hear him again, we can stop you.”

“We can just lock him in his room,” Changbin remarks dryly. “He's been in a working mood again.”

“You say that like you've been much better,” Chan retorts, cocking an eyebrow at Changbin. “What was that I saw about wanting to kiss the stars on a certain someone's skin that is a sky of gold?” He challenges shamelessly.

Jeongin's eyes widen diabolically and he grins widely as Felix's face stains crimson and he stands up, quickly hurrying out of the living room and to his bedroom without so much as a word. Changbin himself is no better, gaping at Chan, his own cheeks scarlet in hue and his mouth opening and closing like a fish. The man coughs. “Low blow, hyung,” he grits with a mortified scowl. “At least I'm not the one talking about a voice like polaris, your guide in the night.”

This time it's Chan's turn to pinken and Hyunjin just grimaces. “And hyungs call me the whipped one.”

“That's because you are,” Changbin, Chan and Jeongin all respond simultaneously and Hyunjin pouts.

“Yah, I'm not that bad!”.

“Worse,” Changbin tells him plainly, just as Felix reappears from the bedroom. Hyunjin naturally notices that he's wiped the BB cream that he tended to use off of his face, exposing the sprinkling of freckles against his faintly tanned skin. Hyunjin's attention is stolen by that and he can't help but grin slightly, perhaps a little mischievously even. He giggles.

Felix settles himself down on the couch beside Jeongin again, looking somewhat shy and pointedly not meeting anyone’s eyes, but even a blind person would be able to know that Changbin was staring at him, and Hyunjin suddenly loves Felix because the blonde had taken the unwanted attention off of him.

Chan clears his throat. “...you kids order whatever you want to eat,” he tells them. “If you need me, I'll be in the room.” And with that, he pointedly leaves.

Jeongin is wearing another ear-to-ear grin and he lifts himself to his feet as well. “I’ll go order food,” he decides, pulling out his phone and stepping away before anyone can call out his limited English.

Hyunjin decides to be a good best friend yet again and stands up, grabbing Seungmin’s wrist and tugging him outside. He wasn’t too afraid of being outdoors because he wasn’t alone and because for whatever odd reason, the sirens were just a little less keen on icing him. He half drags Seungmin up onto their rock at the edge of the outcrop and sits down on its edge, his legs dangling over the periphery. He glances up at Seungmin with a smile. “They’re a case,” he tells him frankly. “Best leave them alone so they can make up for years of literally not doing anything when they’re the most obvious people ever.”

Seungmin settles down beside him and pulls off his hoodie; it was quite hot, too hot for it. The brunette twists to glance back at the bungalow before looking back at Hyunjin. “You have strange friends.”

“I could say the same for you,” Hyunjin points out. He glances over his shoulder and giggles softly. “Yeah, they’re strange, but they’re my second family. Wouldn’t trade them for the world.”

Seungmin nods quietly and then just sits quietly beside him. After a moment, the brunette leans over against Hyunjin, resting his head against his shoulder and sufficiently surprising him. He glances over at Seungmin and after a moment of gathering himself, shifts just a little closer to him. “It’s hot,” he tells him. “Are you feeling dehydrated?”

“A little,” Seungmin admits, and Hyunjin nods, lifting himself to his feet.

“Wait here, I'll get you some water.” Without waiting for a response, he hurries back across the sand and towards their bungalow, slipping inside and pretending that he didn't see Felix and Changbin sucking face. Darting into the kitchen, he steals one of Chan's one litre water bottles and fills it up before hurrying out of the bungalow, this time taking the opportunity to whistle cheekily before darting across the sand, giggling madly as Felix yells creative profanities at him.

When he arrives at the outcrop again, Seungmin is eyeing him dubiously, but he brushes it off and sits down beside him again, holding out the water bottle. “It's just Lix being Lix,” he dismisses, proffering the water bottle towards Seungmin, watching as Seungmin fiddles with it, trying to figure out how it worked. He grins as Seungmin eventually unscrews the lid and takes a draught of water

“Thanks,” Seungmin expresses simply, shutting the lid of the water bottle and holding it in his lap as though it were something precious, and Hyunjin couldn’t help but find it adorable. Again, they dissolve into silence, and this time Hyunjin is a little bolder, leaning against Seungmin and beaming like Christmas had come early when the brunette doesn’t flinch away from him.

“You know,” Hyunjin begins, “they didn’t hesitate.”

“Hm?”

“I told you that we don’t leave each other behind. They didn’t even think about leaving you behind to save themselves, Seungminnie.” When Seungmin doesn’t speak, Hyunjin chuckles. “We’ll all be fine,” he insists. “Somehow. If we try hard enough. Even if it’s not perfectly fine now, we’ll be fine as long as we have each other.”

“Fine, huh,” Seungmin echoes slowly.

Hyunjin just nods, tufts of his hair tickling Seungmin’s jaw as he shifts. “You know, Minnie, I don’t blame you for hating humans,” he mentions softly, weighing his words as he speaks, something that was quite unlike him. He tended to speak without thinking more often than not. He glances up, only to find the brunette staring down at him with an impermeable look on his face.

“You’d hate them too if they did to you what they did to me,” Seungmin responds flatly.

Hyunjin nods. “Yeah, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to understand that,” he admits honestly. “I just...can’t help but think you’re amazing and really strong.” He smiles up at Seungmin, rolling over so that he could lay his head in the brunette’s lap. He raises his arms up and stares at the cloudless sky through the gaps between his slender fingers. “You don’t pity yourself. You live. Even if you do hate us humans...well, in a way, if you didn’t hate us, you wouldn’t be alive right now.”

He lowers his hands onto his stomach and closes his eyes. “Not saying that hating people is a good way to go about things, but you made something that wanted you to die into your strength.” Hyunjin pauses, thinking quietly. “I think...I don’t think that you really hate humans,” he finally states. “You don’t act like you hate me or my friends. You defended humans to your friends even though you had no reason to. I think that you’re actually a very kind person.”

“What makes you think you know me?” Seungmin interjects slowly, his voice carefully blank.

Hyunjin opens his eyes and meets those of the brunette with a smile that made the corners of his eyes crinkle. “I don’t,” he replies easily. “I’m just saying what I think. I could be completely wrong, but that’s the point of talking things out, right? So that we understand each other better afterwards.” He reaches up to poke the mole on the boy’s left cheek and giggles.

“You’re ridiculous, Hwang Hyunjin.”

“Maybe. They say being in love with someone makes people do crazy things,” Hyunjin hums, only to realize what he had just blatantly stated. His face flames up and he lowers his hand to cover his eyes as though if he couldn’t see Seungmin, Seungmin couldn’t see him. He whines in embarrassment, and whines all the more when Seungmin moves his hand away from his eyes, forcing him to look up at the brunette.

“You really don’t give up, do you, Hyunjin?” Seungmin asks, raising an eyebrow at him.

Hyunjin pouts. “Just feed me to the sharks and end my suffering, Minnie,” he gripes.

Seungmin only smiles at him, one of those small ones that he can’t quite decipher, and he feels his heart flutter and his gaze soften.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have realized that due to a bit of rewriting, this story may extend by a chapter or two, we'll have to see  
> i'll see you all again in the next chapter ^^


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for 300+ kudos <3 I wish I could do more than just say thanks but there isn't much more I can do so please accept my thanks >.<  
> This story will be extended, but the amount of chapters it'll be extended by is tbd, so please bear with me

It’s safe to say that, once night falls, sleep runs away from Hyunjin like it’s a wild chicken and he’s the most starved person on the planet. It’s almost like a sense of deja vu, but with less alcohol and no argyle. Hyunjin frowns as he lays curled up by Seungmin, whom he discovered became easily cold in the nighttime and was more than open to cuddles. Normally, if he had someone to hold, he could fall asleep in little to no time, but it’s been almost an hour and here he is, wide awake, listening to the quiet rhythm of Seungmin’s heartbeat within his (bare) chest.

Oh, yes. Dare he mention Seungmin tended to prefer sleeping naked? Although Hyunjin should have figured it out the first time he had shared a bed with the brunette, he doesn’t know why it’s only beginning to sink in now. But that wasn’t what was on Hyunjin’s mind at the moment. He frowns, shifting about for the umpteenth time and burying his face in Seungmin’s chest with a guttural groan.

“Hyunjin, your friends are sleeping.”

“How bold of you to assume my friends sleep,” Hyunjin sighs in response, but he does quiet down anyway.

He peers up at the brunette and frowns slightly. “I can’t sleep,” he mumbles, sighing. Of course, that was only stating the obvious; he had made it quite clear when he had tossed and turned for the last half hour or so and occasionally kicked the mattress in his frustration.

He can practically feel Seungmin’s frown, even if he can’t see his face clearly in the darkness.

“What do you normally do to go to sleep?” Seungmin asks, and Hyunjin pouts.

“Nothing really, just lie down and cuddle something and fall asleep.” He steals another glance up at Seungmin again and frowns. “And currently I’m doing both of those things, but I don’t feel sleepy.”

He feels a weight against the back of his head and realizes only a moment after his face contacts Seungmin’s cool skin that it must have been the boy’s hand. He blinks owlishly, blood rising to his cheeks when he feels Seungmin’s fingers against his scalp. “Seungmin..? I’m a few seconds away from having an aneurysm—”

His voice withers in his throat when he hears the soft, melodic voice begin to sing softly, successfully cutting off both his sentence and his train of thought. For a moment, he even forgets to breathe, Seungmin had caught him so off guard. He could never grow jaded to the brunette’s voice. Every time he heard it, it was like he was hearing it for the first time, and Hyunjin certainly wasn’t about to complain.

He feels a yawn creeping up his throat and he snuggles comfortably up to Seungmin. Whether it was the man’s voice that had sent him off or not he isn’t sure, but in minutes, he’s out like a light.

When he does wake up, he’s blanketed by darkness, and after a moment of panicking and wondering if he died, he realizes that he must have woken up early. He sits up and glances over only to realize that Seungmin is fast asleep. He can’t see all too well in the darkness, but he takes the moment to just watch him. Seungmin’s breaths were soft, as was the rise and fall of his chest, and Hyunjin wanted to coo softly because the boy just looked somehow younger, more innocent.

He reaches down and touches Seungmin’s hair gently, brushing his fingers through the soft strands; they were impossibly soft, Hyunjin would’ve been jealous, was he not so completely and utterly whipped for this boy. He smiles slightly before turning away and frowning. It wasn’t usual for him to wake up early without having to force himself to so much as open his eyes and drag himself out of the bed. He lies down again beside Seungmin and sidles close to him for warmth.

“ _Hwang Hyunjin._ ”

He shoots up again and whips his head around, craning his neck at the window. He frowns. If this was some kind of weird horror dream scenario, Hyunjin would kindly like to remind his sleep-deprived mind that he _did not_ do horror. He frowns.

Logically speaking, if this were a horror scenario, then he should just stick himself to Seungmin in terrified paralysis and not move or make a sound or listen to any weirdly attractive voices that sounded suspiciously like Woojin that call his name and definitely not answer the phone if anyone calls. And probably grab the nearest blunt object to protect himself, should the need arise.

“Hey there, demons, it's me, ya boy,” he ends up blabbing and then silently curses Felix for drilling the declaration into his head because now really wasn't the time.

“Hwang Hyunjin.” The voice sounds closer, and Hyunjin jumps, covering his mouth to stifle the shriek that would've left his throat. Now Hyunjin was rooted to the spot and stubbornly intent on not budging a fraction, but the words that echo loudly within his mind drops his will to the ground. “Go outside and your friends just might be safe.”

Hyunjin gasps at that and practically flies off of the bed, pausing to take the harp seal plush and lay it gently next to Seungmin in case he needed something to cuddle (Hyunjin had priorities, okay). As quickly as possible without tripping over thin air, Hyunjin hurries outside. He remains close to the walls of the bungalow, his gaze narrowed and scanning the expanse, lit only by the dim porch light.

When nothing seems to happen for a good minute, he turns around slowly to head back indoors, but before he can so much as take a step, he hears them.

Of course they were beautiful, but Hyunjin feels nothing but dread as his ears register the angelic harmonies that drifted through the air, seeming to drown out the crashing of the waves over the shoreline. He feels them pulling him, and in that moment he realizes what Chan must have been feeling as he turns sharply and strides for the water, barely flinching at the brisk breeze that drifts over his frame. He tries to find where they are, but their voices seem to have a life of their own, embracing his frame and tugging him along against his will.

He shivers at the first step into the water and tenses slightly, but their voices curl around his limbs like ropes and only pull him further, weaving against one another, each with their own melodic timbre, but complementing each other in a manner that Hyunjin knows many people would give up ridiculous sums of money just for seconds of the heavenly tune.

He gasps as the water rises to his ribs and the voices become louder. He looks down to see the dorsal circling him before Jisung emerges from the dark water, eyes wide and glinting in their steel-blue, sharp teeth flashing in a leering grin that terrifies Hyunjin. He understands now, why Felix had been so disconcerted by the sight of them. Of course Hyunjin knew that Jisung was actually quite an attractive person, but here in the dark of night with only the moon to lend significant light, the man seemed to emerge directly from nightmares, and perhaps he was because even when his hand clamps down on Hyunjin's shoulder, frigid with seawater, Hyunjin can't move.

His lips part, but Jisung doesn't seem too concerned about any potential escapades he might try to make (a very valid lack of concern, considering Hyunjin currently couldn't _move_ ) instead pushing him from behind, forcing him deeper into the water. He's now up to his neck and finding it difficult to breathe, the water was so cold. He feels tears spring to his eyes. His breaths come in gasps. “S..top..” he manages to get out just as Minho rears out of the water in front of him.

The feline-like man just swims a circle around both him and Jisung before pausing to grip his other shoulder, and Hyunjin barely notices his slightly longer than what could be considered normal fingernails digging into his skin. Minho's voice is lighter than Jisung's, with less weight to it, and beautifully lilting, but the two are currently playing the soundtrack for a scenario Hyunjin really doesn't want to be in, and he momentarily blanks out at the realization that they want to kill him. His head whips back only to see Minho's green eyes narrow and feel the man push him forward.

He can't hear anything else but those voices that tangle him up in a spiderweb of something that Hyunjin can tangibly describe as sheer malice. It wraps around him thickly, threatening to suffocate him. He's struggling to keep his head above the water, trying to move his arms and his legs to swim, but they weigh like lead and don't seem to want to move. He goes under, only to bob back to the surface with a breathless gasp and an unintentional scream.

He finally sees Woojin, settled in the nook of an emergent rock. The man watches him, his eyes cold, and Hyunjin feels his heart pounding within his chest as his body freezes up entirely when the man opens his mouth to join the song of the sirens, completing the entrancing harmony that Hyunjin could never enjoy.

It wasn't them, he wanted to remind himself, but he had never in his life felt something so invasive, so malevolent. His eyes widen, catching the light of the moon as he wonders if this was what Seungmin had been hiding in him for all those years; if this was the intensity of the loathing and betrayal and _pain_ that he held inside of him, unbeknownst to anyone save the sirens who were caught in the web of his curse. Hyunjin swallows down the sudden thick feeling in his throat and tears bud in his eyes. “Seungminnie…” he whispers. He had brushed off the boy's feelings, never even attempting to delve a little more and see just how deeply the hurt ran. He hadn't tried to understand Seungmin at all.

He couldn't move. The only things preventing him from sinking were Jisung and Minho's hands on him. They could release him at any moment and he'd just...fall. Slowly, never touching the bottom until his lungs give out or until they exceed their capacity to hold water. The realization that these three held his life in their hands, and clearly weren't going to tolerate doing so for longer didn't bother him so much as the sudden feeling of failure.

He had failed Seungmin.

“You're too close, human,” Jisung hisses, his grip on Hyunjin tightening.

“Why do you keep trying to be near him?” Minho asks before Hyunjin can even consider responding in any way.

“You'll only throw him away again,” Jisung states, his voice dripping with such a honeyed loathing that a shudder runs down Hyunjin's frame, and not from the cold.

“So you need to die first,” Minho declares, his free hand shifting to cradle Hyunjin's jaw, forcing his head to turn so that he meets the man's glowing green eyes and slit-pupils that were too close for comfort.

“You need to die before he gets hurt,” Jisung agrees, head cocked unnaturally as he stares at Hyunjin.

Forced to keep eye contact with the sirens, Hyunjin doesn't hear them any more. He hears Seungmin, as though it were the brunette's thoughts projected through them. As though Seungmin were accusing him. Not accusing— that wasn't right. It was as though the boy was finally sharing his fears. Hyunjin's vision blurs with tears that came a little too easily. No matter how strong Seungmin was, of course he couldn't bear everything by himself. And Hyunjin had the opportunity to help him bear them. But he hadn't. He had focussed on himself and his own infatuation.

He somehow manages to jerk his head out of Minho's grasp only to find him face to face with Woojin, the man's gaze sharp and intimidating, and his expression stony to match.

“Die,” Woojin states simply, his voice like steel, and as though that were a command, both Minho and Jisung drag him down. His eyes widen and he barely manages to draw in a breath before he surrounding by coldness and darkness, the silhouettes of the two sirens circling him, their voices echoing clearly in his mind despite the fact that they were underwater, and Hyunjin tries to move, tries to swim, but they hold him down with their voices, control his movements in the currents forced into motion by their powerful tails. 

Hyunjin's eyes widen as he realizes that he's going to die. They're going to kill him. He's going to die.

When the terror of the situation sinks in, he begins to move, his body acting on autopilot in a natural instinct of self-preservation, but to no avail. It's nothing but a waste of his energy as he tries to keep his breath held under the water. He's too deep now to be able to discern where the moon hung, it's hopelessly dark and everything around him seems to have slowed down.

Now the voices of the sirens aren't as pertinent as the blood rushing in his ears, pounding through his veins, screaming at him in stress that was spilling the strength out of his body. The water is no longer cold, but it's too much to hold his breath any longer. He stops struggling as his lips part and water rushes into his lungs. His eyes widen, terror flooding them as he chokes on water only to inhale more, and it’s becoming too much, his senses feel fried and he can’t think properly. His vision blanks out momentarily before slowly fading into darkness again.

And then everything grows quiet, the ringing of his terrified heart no longer pounding against his eardrums, the song of the sirens becoming distant, as though muffled through a wall, his own screams quieting.

Hyunjin opens his eyes and stares up at the surface that seemed so far away. It was odd, how everything seemed peaceful now. The water wasn't cold, it was warm and it embraced him, and maybe drifting down into those depths wouldn't be so bad. His hand shifts and he reaches up with the tiny fragment of strength that he has left. He watches the dim moonlight dancing through the water between the gaps in his fingers. It mirrored a sky he recalled seeing once. His lips curve into a resigned smile. That seemed so long ago.

He couldn’t breathe. The pressure that had built up was fading, and Hyunjin felt...serene. His limbs felt leaden and his hand eventually sinks down in the water along with the rest of him, borne along the currents. He can’t feel the sirens’ presence any longer. He can only feel his own heartbeat, and he was growing numb to even that. He closes his eyes and sinks, his consciousness gently fading away with the calm sea.

 

It was quiet.

 

Slow.

 

 _Peaceful_.

 

Hyunjin barely registers the pair of arms the wrap around him and drag him up, hangs limp when his frame tastes air again. Clearly unconscious, he’s not there to feel the pain of scrapes on his joints as Seungmin drags him up onto the crag and deposits him carefully on it, a frantic look in his eyes.

“Hyunjin— Hyunjin!” Seungmin leans over him, trying to listen for his breathing, trying to find a pulse, anything that would give him sign that the man was capable of being saved.

The brunette tenses when he hears a particularly violent splash against the crag and he glares over the edge of the jagged rock at Minho, who stares back up at him wide-eyed, gaze eerily blank. The siren latches onto the niches in the rock and drags himself up it and Seungmin just shakes his head frantically. “Haven’t you done enough?!” he yells hoarsely down at him, his voice growing angrier when he sees Jisung rise behind the leopard-tailed man, and then Woojin following.

Seungmin backs away from the border of the rock, his arms reaching out to hold Hyunjin who felt so _cold._ Seungmin tenses at the sensation. Hyunjin’s body warmth was unlike any other, the man was a living furnace at times. Him feeling so _frigid_ wasn’t natural. It frightened Seungmin. His eyes widen as the three pull themselves onto the surface of the crag, and his eyes glint silver as he edges closer to the opposite rim.

“Don’t touch him, leave him alone,” Seungmin hisses, his voice desperate. His grip on Hyunjin tightens and he flinches as the man’s head lolls over lifelessly.

“Seungmin,” Woojin murmurs, his voice oozing a false kind of savoir faire. He slinks past Minho and Jisung, both of whom were definitely not acting like themselves. Seungmin inches further away from him with each move that is made towards him.

“Get away,” Seungmin whispers back, his own voice laced with distress.

Woojin shakes his head, his golden eyes glinting, reflecting a maliciousness that was very unlike him. “Seungmin, don’t you see? We’re keeping you safe. He’s hazardous to you. All humans are. If you let your guard down, they’ll take advantage of you.”

“And he’s been getting a little _too_ friendly,” Jisung adds, jabbing a finger at Hyunjin’s limp figure. “He’s only going to hurt you. So he has to go.”

“And after him, all his friends,” Minho adds, slinking forward suddenly, quicker than Woojin or Jisung, curling himself around Hyunjin and Seungmin, both of whom were precariously close to the edge of the rock face. Minho reaches out to grab Hyunjin by the hair, lifting his head up, and Seungmin’s eyes widen. “We’ll pluck them off before they have a chance to harm you, Seungminnie.”

“We’ll protect you, Woojin adds, his lips parting to reveal his pointed teeth. Whether it was a grin or a snarl on his face, Seungmin couldn’t tell, but in the moment he had never felt more cornered and, dare he say, afraid. Hyunjin wasn’t conscious, and Seungmin couldn’t even ascertain the simple fact if he was even _alive_ or not.

The few split-seconds of silence seem like hours to Seungmin, the moment frozen in time as Minho’s hand shifts to rest perilously over Hyunjin’s bare neck, Woojin and Jisung watching on without an inch of sympathy to spare in their eyes, and Seungmin just feels an old terror rise in his chest and up his throat. He felt nauseous.

Shifting, he slams his own body bluntly into Minho’s, knocking the man off his perch and into the water. Seungmin wasn’t too concerned; there were no other smaller rocks to hurt the siren and water was his element anyway, but his arms snake around Hyunjin’s frame and he pulls him closer, shielding him from the remaining two. “No, stop, stop it!” he screams at them, his voice rising in both volume and pitch.

“You’re not protecting me!” He stares at them, his eyes wide, pupils trembling as a sudden fire of resentment courses through his body. “You’re only hurting others! Making mistakes and getting hurt is just a part of being human!” He shudders and looks down at Hyunjin’s pale face, not even lighted by the moon, which was hiding behind dense clouds. He lowers the man gently down again and pulls himself to his feet, standing in front of him protectively, arms spread wide. “I am human!” he yells hoarsely. “If you want to kill humans, then kill me too!”

He feels pinpricks at his eyes and he tilts his head back to stare at the sky, trying to contain the tears. Seungmin hated crying, much less in front of others. His hands ball into tight fists and a hushed sob escapes his lips. “My parents weren’t good humans, but it doesn’t mean all humans are bad!” He reaches up to swipe at his eyes when he feels the tears escape before lowering his head to glare at them. “Hyunjin saved my life...I would’ve drowned if he didn’t find me. He’s a fool, but he’s never been anything but kind to me. He’s never asked for anything in return even though I owed him my life.”

Seungmin glances back at Hyunjin before whipping away as more tears bloom in his eyes. His head falls as he finds himself unable to maintain eye contact. He rubs his eyes stubbornly. “His friends have never judged me even though they knew what I was. They’ve treated me like a friend.” He swallows back another sob.

“If that’s what it means to be human, even if there’s still evil ones, I want to be human too,” he whispers, his voice cracking. He crouches down and hides his face in his hands. “I don’t hate humans. I don’t hate them. There are so many good humans…” He grips his hair and just weeps, the gasped, muted sounds drowned out by the occasional wave the crashed against the crag. “Hyunjin is a good human… Hyunjin cared about me even though he had no reason to. He’s done a million things for me for no reason other than that he liked me. No— he loves me,” Seungmin whispers, his voice trembling. His eyes widen.

 _“They say being in love with someone makes people do crazy things.”_ Hyunjin had said it with such a careless smile on his face.

And suddenly, Seungmin knows that he needs to save this man, this man that turned everything he had believed in on its head, this dumb man with a defective brain-to-mouth filter, a smile that made his eyes disappear and a dorky laugh that could light up an entire room; this man with more insight in his left pinky than Seungmin had allowed himself to have for his entire life, who cared as much as he complained, who protected his friends selflessly. Even if it was fruitless, he needed to at least try.

His hands settle on Hyunjin’s chest, alternating between compressions and ventilation, desperately begging him to wake up in between. His tears make no difference as they drop onto Hyunjin’s already saturated shirt, but  he persists, not willing to give up. He’s so occupied that he doesn’t notice that neither Woojin or Jisung, or even Minho, who had pulled himself back onto the ledge, were making any movements towards him, the trio just staring blankly as though frozen to the spot.

“Hyunjin, please,” he pleads aimlessly, pushing the water out of him and breathing into his lungs. “Wake up..”

It was becoming increasingly difficult for Seungmin to think straight. His mind was clouded by something painful, something he didn’t recognize. He didn’t want Hyunjin to die. He couldn’t let Hyunjin die. He didn’t want Hyunjin to die, he didn’t want Chan or Felix or Changbin or Jeongin to die. He didn’t want the humans to die. He didn’t want any of them to die. Seungmin chokes on his own tears as he has to pull away from Hyunjin to wipe his eyes with his wrist. He grimaces and leans down again, pushing water out of Hyunjin’s lungs and breathing air into them.

It’s almost the reversal of a situation he can only vaguely recall years ago, screaming for someone to save him, his vision darkening as water filled his lungs. It had been painful, painful in a betrayed, hateful way. This was different, this pain was worse. It threatened to drown Seungmin in a different way, crush his heart under its weight. It wasn’t hate, it was worry, care, _love…_

Seungmin feels the air knocked out of him at a realization that seems to calm the tempest inside of him. As heavy-hearted as the situation was, it made him feel lighter. As though something that had been burdening him unknowingly had fled. He moves away from Hyunjin and stares down at him again through blurred vision. Wiping his eyes, he draws in a breath and leans down to encapsulate Hyunjin’s lips in his own. Not attempting to do anything more. He cared about this man. This man made him care.

 

“He’s a human!”

 

Seungmin rears back and gasps as he feels fingers curl around his shoulder, nails digging into his skin, tearing him away from Hyunjin and sending him sprawling over the rock face that honest wasn’t all that broad to begin with. He winces at the abrasions that redden his bare skin, but immediately whips around only to find Jisung towering over him, reared up and tugging Minho back onto the crag.

The leopard-tailed man’s eyes are unnaturally bright, glinting in the darkness and looking deader than Seungmin had ever seen them before, and in that moment he could understand that these two were not the two he knew. A cold wave of dread washes over his skin as he pulls himself onto his feet and stumbles forward. He feels something cold wrap around his arm and hold him back and his first instinct is to just _get away,_ get to Hyunjin.

“Let go of me!” he screeches, jerking away from Woojin just as Jisung raises his hand, his clawlike nails glinting dimly in the silverish reflection of the water. Seungmin’s eyes widen. “No— Jisung!” He grabs Jisung’s wrist and holds onto it tightly, only to have Minho dart between them and grab hold of Hyunjin’s collar, hefting him upright. Hyunjin’s head lolls weakly to the side and Seungmin feels his heart sink.

“We’re sorry, Seungminnie, the human has to die,” Minho tells him, his voice deceptively gentle. It crawled into Seungmin’s ears like worms and made him shudder. Minho wasn’t supposed to sound like that. He releases Jisung’s hand and whispers an apology before elbowing him in the ribs and sending him flying off the edge of the rock face before turning on Minho.

His eyes widen as he sees the siren’s slender fingers wrapped around Hyunjin’s neck. He shakes his head. “Stop— stop!” When he lunges forward, he’s dragged back by Woojin’s strong arms, and this time, no matter how much he struggles, the siren is ready for him. He can’t move an inch.

It’s cold. Woojin is cold. The wind is cold and the air is cold and Seungmin’s mind is cold. And his heart grows colder with each passing moment, as his eyes, glazed silver, are forced to watch Hyunjin. Hyunjin, unconscious and too lifeless to even try to escape Minho’s grip, which encircles his neck so tightly that his skin is beginning to purple from the strangled circulation.

“Hyunjin please—” Seungmin whispers. “Hyunjin…” He draws in a heavy breath, the beginnings of tears blooming in the corners of his eyes. “ _Hwang Hyunjin!_ ”

Seungmin’s eyes widen in horror and the first tear escapes without obstruction when the first droplet of blood draws a line down Hyunjin’s neck from where Minho’s nails dig into his skin. He feels his strength turn to ashes when the green-eyed siren hefts Hyunjin over the precipice of the crag and releases him into the water, his voice ringing sweetly over the eerily quiet waters that swell, a splash resounding over the open expanse.

A sob leaves Seungmin’s lips as nothing breaks the silence save the gentle beating of the waves against the rock and the light timbre of Minho’s voice that is soon joined by Jisung, who pulls himself up onto a cleft in the crag. When Woojin’s dark voice resounds from behind him, Seungmin feels the grip on him relinquished and he crumbles to his knees, tears falling from his eyes and striking the surface of the water that glinted a cold silver.

Their voices were nothing new to him. He’s had the pleasure of hearing them many times, always accounted their song to be the most ethereal in the world, understood that they were the closest the world would have to hearing angels. But now their voices crept into his ears unbidden and sat in his mind like stone, splintered his heart within his chest, burnt his veins, enshrouded his lungs like smoke and blinded his eyes:

He understood now, that the song of the sirens was nothing but a funeral dirge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> trivia: Hyunjin initially wasn't supposed to die but I really can't control myself apparently  
> thank you for taking time to read this, I'll see you all next chapter :)


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... I should probably apologize for throwing that out there last chapter, but please bear with me >.<  
> I will just say that there's a specific reason why I didn't file this under major character death and chose to go with creator chose not to use archive warnings  
> Thank you for staying with me nonetheless, and giving all your support like you always do <3

When Chan had awoken in the ungodly hours of the morning as he tended to do sometimes, he hadn’t expected to be drawn out to the seaside. At first he worried that it was another attempt by the sirens to drown him, like Seungmin had claimed was the case before, but there was no song in his mind, nothing. Just an urge that tugged at his instinct.

The closer he draws to the shoreline, the clearer the scene becomes, of the quiet waves lapping at the white sand, the sun having dyed the sky in a warm halo of peaches and rose. And sitting stretched out between the ebbing line where land met sea, Chan catches sight of a familiar figure, slender, lined with scrapes and welts. His arms encircle one bare knee that’s been pulled to an equally bare chest and morning light glimmers off the adornments on his body. Chan frowns, noting that his presence had either gone unnoticed or unacknowledged.

He quietly approaches Seungmin and sits down beside him, his eyes glued to the horizon. He feels the brunette tense at his side and realizes that Seungmin mustn’t have noticed his presence. He draws in a deep breath, catching the vaguely salty air with a sigh. “You’re out early,” he remarks, his voice low and partially sleep-ridden.

When Seungmin only lets out a shaky sigh in response, it doesn’t take much for Chan to understand that something is wrong. And as the responsible friend, he turns to look at Seungmin only for his eyes to widen when he meets the reddened and bloodshot ones of the brunette. “Seungmin, are you all right?”

“I’m...fine,” Seungmin whispers, his voice cracking.

Chan sidles closer to him and removes the hoodie that he had thrown on because early mornings were often brisk. He just throws it over Seungmin’s shoulders before throwing an arm around him. “Hey, did something happen?”

Seungmin just clucks his tongue with a harsh sigh and turns his head away from the man, unable to meet his eyes.

Chan watches him carefully before patting his shoulder and shifting away slightly to give him space. “I hope you know you can talk to us about anything,” he tells the brunette gently. “We’re a rowdy bunch, but I promise we aren’t all bad.”

When Seungmin doesn’t respond, Chan eyes him worriedly, his eyes widening when he sees the transparent streaks trailing down the boys cheeks. He takes Seungmin's head in his hands, more out of a natural instinct than anything and wipes away the tear-tracks. “Seungmin, what's wrong?” He asks him.

“What's wrong…?” Seungmin echoes, his voice tight, as though he was forcing it from the confines of his throat where it remained stuck. “Everything is wrong, Chan. Everything. Ah—” he lowers his head and scrubs at his eyes with the heel of his hand.

“Hey, let's get you inside and warmed up,” Chan decides, standing up and holding his hand out for Seungmin to take, but the brunette doesn’t accept it. Instead Seungmin only rises to his feet and holds Chan’s sweatshirt out to him.

“Don’t bother. You won’t be seeing me again,” he states, finally meeting Chan’s eyes.

The curly-haired man’s brow knits at that. “Why, did something happen..?”

The brunette leans in closer to him and whispers softly into his ear, and he tenses, his eyes widening in what would’ve been comical was it not for the news that the boy had just revealed to him. His lips part, but no sound leaves them. As he stands, frozen to the spot, Seungmin turns around and takes a step into the sea, but before he can dive beneath the gently lapping waves, fingers wrap around his wrist. Seungmin glances back to see Chan’s pale hand gripping onto him.

“Seungmin… Hyunjin— he’s really…” The man’s voice doesn’t even lilt up in question as it drifts off with the morning breeze, soft and twined with dread.

“I’m sorry,” Seungmin whispers, his voice cracking again. “I’m sorry I couldn’t—” he breaks off and stares down into the water, fresh teardrops joining the salty sea. His hand balls into a tight fist and he closes his eyes, a quiet sob leaving his lips like a gasp.

He feels himself tugged back and his eyes widen as Chan grabs his shoulders, holding onto them tightly and staring him directly in the eyes, spearing through him. “Seungmin, this is a joke, right? Is it another one of Hyunjin’s pranks? Did he rope you into this?”

“Chan…”

“He’s probably going to jump out of the water and laugh in my face, right? Right?” Chan’s voice is strangled as he doesn’t move his gaze away from Seungmin’s. “He’s really fine, right?”

Seungmin lifts his arm, his own hand curling around one of the man’s wrists and he grips it tightly. “Why are you making me say it again?” he asks, the tone of his voice rising. “Don’t make me say it again—”

“Say it!” Chan insists, his voice unintentionally rising with a tinge of hysteria. His gaze shines darker than Seungmin has ever seen it, and the brunette flinches. Seungmin releases his wrist and Chan catches himself. “I’m sorry— I just…”

“Chan, Chan, Hyunjin is dead,” Seungmin forces out, choking past his words, tears escaping his tired eyes. “They tried to drown him. He must have still been alive when I got to him— I tried to revive him, but they grabbed me and held me back. They strangled him and threw him into the sea. Chan, he’s dead— Hyunjin is dead.” This time it’s Seungmin who teeters precariously on the border of hysteria, his words babbled, mixing together and nearly slurred.

Seungmin feels his heart break for the nth time that morning as the older man cracks in front of him.

 

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

Between the humans and the sirens, Seungmin isn’t sure where he belongs any more. He doesn’t want to face Woojin, Minho and Jisung, but he finds that he can’t face Changbin, Jeongin, Felix and Chan either. That’s how he finds himself holed up in Hyunjin’s designated room, just an oversized hoodie thrown onto his frame and the harp seal plush in his hands.

It’s been hours since Chan had found him on the beach, hours since they had returned to the bungalow and hours since Seungmin had seen far more tears than he’s ever seen in his entire life, hours since he had retreated to this room. He isn’t quite sure how much time had passed since he had sat himself down and just remained there.

He eyes the plush creature in his hands, his fingers trailing across the synthetic fur. Hyunjin had said it reminded him of Seungmin. The thought makes Seungmin’s chest ache. Hyunjin was an idiot. If he had only left; if only they had never met. _If only…_ Seungmin hated that phrase.

A quiet sob catches in his throat and he buries his face in the fur of the harp seal plush.

_If only you hadn’t loved me._

Seungmin breathes in slowly and closes his eyes. Maybe humans did cause pain. So much pain.

He raises his head when he hears a tentative knock, and then watches, unmoving, as the door opens and a head of brown hair pops in, narrow eyes meeting his. He looks away again.

“Hyung..” He feels the mattress shift and tenses when he feels Jeongin’s frame beside his own. He only looks up when the younger man’s slender hand shifts to rest on his. The fox-eyed boy offers him a strained smile, and Seungmin doesn’t miss the rawness around his eyes. “It’ll be okay.”

So maybe humans did cause pain. But did Seungmin hate them?

He feels tears well up in his eyes again and he lowers his head to hide his face as it contorts, his shoulders shaking as he cries bitterly. His cheeks redden with shame that he had to be seen like this, but he tenses as he feels an arm around him, pulling him close. His tears soak Jeongin’s shirt, but the boy doesn’t seem to care.

No, no he didn’t hate them.

“Hyunjin hyung is such an idiot,” Jeongin mumbles. “He promised me he wasn’t going anywhere— He promised me that no one was going to die...”

Seungmin can hear the effort that it takes for the youngest to keep his voice from wobbling too excessively, and if anything, that makes him cry harder. He’s exhausted himself too many times today from crying alone, but he never seemed to lose his reserve.

It takes him a few minutes to calm himself down, but when he does, he feels Jeongin’s hands making him lift his head and he’s forced to meet the boy’s eyes. He can see stale tracks formed by Jeongin’s own tears drawing stark lines on his face and he draws in a sharp breath, but that doesn’t pierce him as deeply as the boy’s next words.

“Seungmin hyung, did you love Hyunjin hyung?”

The question hangs delicately in the following silence, even the soft sound of their muffled sniffles and occasional sighs quieting at the poignancy of it all. Seungmin closes his eyes, his head resting against Jeongin’s shoulder as he clears his mind bit by bit.

_Did you love Hyunjin?_

Did he? Seungmin had never cared much for love at all. Of course he knew what it was to care about someone. He cared about his second family, Woojin, Minho and Jisung—still did, despite his grief at what they had done— and he most certainly had grown to care about these humans, Chan, Changbin, Felix, Jeongin, and yes, Hyunjin, but love? Seungmin feels his insides ache with the kind of uncomfortable throbbing pain that made nausea crawl up his throat.

He absently toys with the seal plush’s fur caught up in his muddled thoughts. Love was what drew Hyunjin to him. Even when he had been unwelcoming, even when he had shut himself to the man. Love was what had made Hyunjin stay. If only he hadn’t been so stupid. If only he hadn’t let Hyunjin stay. If only he hadn’t opened himself to Hyunjin… _If only._ There was that phrase again.

And yet, he had. As though there had been, in his heart, a flicker of hope. That maybe humans weren’t as bad as he had believed. As though maybe there was someone that cared about him the same way that Minho and Jisung cared about each other. Although deepsea forbid Hyunjin was anything like those two: Seungmin was sure he’d go mad if that were the case.

 _If that were the case…_ A sound caught between a chuckle and a sob evokes from his throat. There was no more chance to see if that would be the case. If Hyunjin hadn’t been dead when he had pulled him out of the sea, he would certainly be dead now. Minho and Jisung had accomplished it and Woojin had ensured it. A shudder wracks through Seungmin’s frame as he recalls the siren disappearing beneath the waves only to break surface with watered blood reddening his hands.

Had he loved Hyunjin? Who knew. But Seungmin knew one thing, and that was that, in the sparse time he had spent with Hyunjin, his animosity towards humans had vanished. He had felt lighter. Happier. Hyunjin made his heart lighter, made him think that humans were beautiful creatures. Hyunjin had given him hope. Hyunjin had slowly pervaded through the wall he had built against humanity. Hyunjin was someone he wished he could keep close to himself. Hyunjin was someone he wanted to have with him in the future. Hyunjin _was._

 

_Was._

 

Seungmin’s eyes scrunch shut as he feels a fresh onslaught of tears. He feels cold. Although Jeongin was right beside him, sharing warmth, Seungmin still feels cold. He wasn’t Hyunjin. He didn’t radiate the same warmth that Hyunjin did. And suddenly, amongst everyone he had, amongst the sirens and the humans that he had learned to call friend and family, he felt so terribly alone.

He wanted Hyunjin. He wanted him back. He wanted to share warmth and smiles and small conversations and laughter with him. He wanted to see him act like a fool and get embarrassed and whiny. He wanted to eat chicken with him and drink water with him. He wanted Hyunjin.

“I—” His voice cracks. “I didn’t love him.” He wipes at his eyes with the heel of his hand. Even his own body warmth which was meager in itself felt cold. “I didn’t want to. He was human. I hate humans.” He stops talking altogether and just stares down at his hands. Seungmin curls his fingers slowly, as though reassuring himself that they were capable of moving. How strange… they were blurry.

“Then why are you crying, hyung?”

Why was he crying? It wasn’t often that Seungmin cried. Seungmin hadn’t cried in years until he had met Hyunjin. Before Hyunjin, the last time Seungmin had cried was from Woojin's clawlike nails rending down his neck, and even then it had been a physiological reaction to the stimulus of pain. So why _was_ he crying? He dabs at his eyes and cheeks again, trying to blink the tears away, but they didn't seem to want to stop coming. “I don't… I don't know, Jeongin.”

“That's a lie.”

Seungmin tenses. For a few moments he barely reacts. Finally, “I don't know if I loved him.” He draws in a slow breath. “But I do love him. I love him for not hating me and showing me things that I wouldn't have tried to understand and I love him because he treated me like I was wanted…” Seungmin's voice tightens. “He treated me like he wanted me.”

The verbalized realization made Seungmin's eyes widen and he lowers his head into his hands, unwilling to cry again. What Hyunjin had done was something no human had ever done to him. Maybe because they were killed off before they had the chance, but maybe Hyunjin had affected him from the moment they met when he had dragged him out of the sea. Maybe the encompassing darkness in his heart had mitigated when it understood the purity of the love that Hyunjin had, and Hyunjin certainly had a lot of it. Maybe he hated humans a little less whenever he was with Hyunjin.

He feels a pair of arms wrap around him and he just weeps silently into his hands again.

For how long Jeongin just stays next to him to comfort him although the boy barely knew him, Seungmin isn't sure, but he's grateful nonetheless. Although Jeongin's warmth isn't much, it's still there, and it's comforting.

There's a small knock on the door, and after a few moments of tentative silence, it opens to reveal a tuft of blonde hair, a blotchy face with reddened eyes and a glass of water in small hands. “...hey,” Felix greets, his voice slightly hoarse although he attempts to crack a small smile. Seungmin just looks away.

He was the reason Hyunjin wasn't here, after all.

“I brought you some water, Min,” Felix says, his voice low and soft and surprisingly enough, not resentful in the slightest. Seungmin casts a side glance at him when he sets himself down on the bed as well and holds the water out, and after a moment's reluctance, accepts it. He raises it to his lips, his breath fogging up the rim, and takes a sip.

“Thank you,” he mutters, his voice barely audible.

“How are you feeling?” Felix asks, and Seungmin just wants to know why he sounded so concerned.

Seungmin raises his head from the glass and just scrutinizes the blonde blankly. “Why does it matter to you?” He asks him, a little more bluntly than intended.

“Because Hyunjin was important to you, anyone with half a blind eye can see that,” Felix responds almost snarkily, and Jeongin cracks a small smile at that.

Seungmin purses his lips and looks away from him, holding the glass of water in both his hands and staring at the distorted image of them through the water. He frowns. “That's no good reason…” he murmurs. “He’d still be alive if it wasn't for me.”

“That's not what Chris said,” Felix interjects. “You tried to save him.”

“He wouldn't even have been in that situation if it wasn't for me.”

“Min.” Felix's voice is so serious that it coaxes his head up in itself to meet the blonde's tear-reddened eyes. “I've never seen Hyunjin as happy as he was around you. I know that if he had to choose between this and never meeting you, he'd be the idiot he is and choose this.” And Seungmin's throat tightens again at the sincerity in Felix's voice. He sees the blonde's smaller hands wrap around his own that are still holding the glass of water. “And even if you showed it a little differently, I know you must have at least cared for him.”

Seungmin's head falls tiredly. “I love him,” he admits, sounding more defeated than anything else. “But it's too late.”

Felix just nods slowly and wraps his arms around Seungmin, pulling the brunette in for a hug. Seungmin doesn't try to pull away from him, instead burying his face in the crook of Felix's neck and sighing.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

When Seungmin had finally been left alone as per his own request, he curls up quietly against the headboard of the bed, his head lolling slightly as he eyes the empty space beside him. The glass of water was long gone and although the sun shone brightly outside and the weather was warm, Seungmin still felt hopelessly cold, his skin stiff and lined with goosebumps. His knees are pulled to his chest and his arms hold the harp seal plush close, his position making him seem smaller than he really was.

It was quiet; quieter than he had ever experienced with the humans, and the grief of the entire situation seemed to bear down heavily on the very air around them. Seungmin closes his eyes with a soft sigh. It didn’t seem right. Seeing them cry didn’t seem right. Seeing them so reserved didn’t seem right. None of this was right.

His fingers trace invisible patterns into the plush fur of the little creature in his arms and he hums softly to himself as though it brought some kind of comfort. He felt uncomfortable in his own skin now, as though everything that defined him before didn’t any more and he was just wandering about like a lost puppy. He didn’t want to comfort himself in the familiarity of the sea, surrounded by water. Hyunjin’s body was down there somewhere. But he didn’t want to be here above ground, surrounded by humans who had every reason to hate him but for some reason didn’t.

He reaches out to touch the empty space beside himself and silently wonders when he had become used to having Hyunjin beside him. He hadn’t even known him for more than a few days, but somehow the man had left an imprint that just refused to go away. Somehow Seungmin was beginning to think he hated it because now the emptiness that he had adamantly left unacknowledged pressed him harder.

“You idiot,” he whispers softly, his fingertips barely brushing the empty mattress. “You really didn’t give up, did you. Look where you are now.” His words are scathing, but his voice is soft, tinged with something almost like heartache. A bitter smile curls onto his lips. “Look what your infatuation did to you.”

His hand curls into a fist. “Can you hear me now?” He murmurs, barely thinking about his words, speaking to the thin air as though it would relieve him of the burgeoning weight on his chest. “No, of course you can't. You never liked listening to reason.” Seungmin breathes out and lifts his gaze to the large window, taking in the sight of the sea, turquoise and glimmering like the aquamarines that lined his thighs. “I don't want to see you,” he mutters. “I don't want to see what they did to you.”

A wave of despair crashes into him as he relives the events of the night before. “I'm sorry,” he whispers, a slight tremor sneaking back into his voice. “I couldn't save you from them— I couldn't save you from me..”

That's right. If it wasn't for the malice fostered in his heart for humanity, maybe Hyunjin would still be alive. Maybe there wouldn't have been tears in his friends’ eyes. Maybe the silence that Seungmin loved wouldn't be so oppressive. Seungmin curls in on himself again, his hand retracting to his chest, cuddling the plush that was his meagre source of comfort.

He closes his eyes and just tries to block out everything, just tries to go blank for a few moments. Thinking too much was exhausting him. He ends up falling asleep in his attempt, curled up in a half upright position against the wooden headboard, arms locked around the plush as though it was something dear to him.

That's how Changbin finds him when he had been sent to check on the brunette by Chan who had opted to occupy himself in the kitchen instead of ordering takeout. The shorter man just takes the blanket and pulls it over Seungmin's curled up frame without a second thought. After a moment, Changbin props Seungmin's head comfortably against a pillow as well so that the boy wouldn't wake up too sore.

He fails to notice how Seungmin's eyes barely crack open as he leaves the room to join the two youngest on the couch, both of whom are staring mindlessly at whatever nature documentary is being played on the tv, neither seeming to have too much interest in it. Felix was contorted oddly on the couch, one leg hanging off of it, the other pulled up, and his head resting on Jeongin's thigh. Jeongin in particular seemed terribly listless which was very unlike him, and the bags under his eyes spoke volumes.

“Hey, Innie, you should go take a nap,” Changbin suggests, his tone low and gentle, treading over the words like they were glass.

The youngest turns to stare at him and he sighs, seeing the redness in Jeongin's gaze. Felix sits up and runs his fingers through his hair, pulling his fringe out of his face with a rough sigh of his own. “How’s Seungmin?”

“Was sleeping when I went in,” Changbin responds. “He looks like he took it hard.”

“So did we,” Felix mumbles. “Can't blame him.”

“You sure about that?” Changbin challenges in a monotone a few moments after Felix's words sink into the silence.

Felix's forehead creases at the implication and he turns to meet Changbin's eyes. “What are you trying to say?”

“I'm trying to say that we shouldn't have trusted him,” Changbin states bluntly. “I had a bad feeling about him when we first met him. And now this. Now Jin's…gone. Because of him.”

“You can't say that!” Felix immediately disagrees, sitting fully upright and staring down at Changbin.

“And you can't say I'm wrong! You almost died, Lix! Chan hyung almost died too! Because of him and his friends!”

“Didn't you see how upset he was?” the blonde argues. “He wanted to protect us! Chris would be dead right now if it wasn't for him!” Felix stares defiantly at the older man, his gaze glazing over. “Hyung, we all miss Hyunjin. But it's not Seungmin's fault things happened like this! We can't blame him just because we're upset.”

“Hyunjin deserved better than him,” Changbin insists, his own voice growing a fraction harsher. “He at least deserved someone who would treat him right.”

Felix stands up, his gaze dark. “Seo Changbin, you rethink what you just said,” he states before storming off into the kitchen.

Jeongin winces. “Wow, you done screwed up, hyung,” he remarks without even turning away from the tv screen, earning himself a sharp look. He barely bats an eyelid at the dark aura that seems to exude from both his side and the kitchen at this point.

Changbin doesn't budge from the couch and Felix doesn't set foot out of the kitchen for the longest while, and even when the smell of what seemed suspiciously like pasta wafts through the air, no one dares budge an inch, as though it would shatter the delicate, albeit uncomfortably thick atmosphere between them all.

It’s shattered anyway by the obtrusive sound of a door opening and Seungmin with bird's nest hair and sleep-worn eyes padding out of the room, still clinging to the harp seal plush. Jeongin is the first to look up and naturally snorts at the mess that is Seungmin's hair although it probably wasn't that funny to begin with. He does notice how Changbin tenses beside him, but he chooses to say nothing about it.

As it so turns out, he doesn't need to. Seungmin seems to gather himself and retreats back into the room before returning, this time with significant lack of harp seal and messy hair. The brunette approaches Changbin tentatively, receiving an apprehensive glance for his troubles.

“Changbin...hyung,” Seungmin tries slowly, as though unfamiliar with the honorific which he probably was. He breathes in slowly. “I heard what you said about me earlier.” His voice is surprisingly steady. “And you're probably right.” Seungmin doesn't break his gaze away even when he sees Changbin's eyes narrow slightly. Seungmin lowers his head slightly. “If it makes you feel any better, you can hit me as hard as you want.”

Jeongin tenses. “Hyung!”

“No one is fighting under this roof as long as I'm in this house—”

“Hey, Chris, calm down.”

Chan glances back incredulously at Felix, whose hand is clamped around his wrist. The blonde's eyes are fixed intently on the scene, but he remains planted firmly in the kitchen.

Seungmin glances down at Jeongin and then over at Chan and Felix. He shrugs noncommittally and lowers his head so that he doesn't need to meet any of their gazes. “It's fine. I probably deserve it anyway.”

Changbin just stands up, and although he's considerably and almost comically shorter than Seungmin, the look in his eyes makes the effect diminish. He raises his hand and makes Seungmin look up and at him, and he searches the brunette's eyes for a small while before just shaking his head and sighing.

“Nevermind. I stand corrected, apparently.”

“Eh?” Seungmin stares at him in wide-eyed puzzlement.

“You're both idiots. You're just right for each other.”

Seungmin just stares at him, his face blank and very bemused. He jumps slightly when Felix throws an arm around him (since when had he gotten there anyway?) and eyes Changbin scathingly.

“Hyung, you could just say you aren't mad at him.”

Changbin turns to meet Seungmin's eyes. “I'm not mad at you,” he echoes, surprising both Seungmin and Felix. “You're just another lost kid like the rest of us, trying to find their way, right? Wouldn't be right of me to be mad at you.” He cracks his neck absently and sighs. “You couldn't have done anything. In the end you're still human like the rest of us.”

Seungmin's lips part. “I—”

“Changbin is right,” Chan interjects before Seungmin can deny anything, striding out of the kitchen with a dishcloth thrown over his shoulder. “We've all lost our ways before. We've found a direction together but we're still looking. You've just joined us. And honestly, I think that Hyunjin may have found his own way whether we like it or not.” He offers Seungmin a sad smile. “There's nothing we can do, and if we hate you, that won't make things any better because you're only as good as we are.”

In the succeeding silence that follows, Seungmin somehow finds himself wrapped in the centre of a group hug, and normally he would be averse to it, but this time he only welcomes it. He closes his eyes. Maybe this was just another part of being human. Laughing together, crying together, getting angry and apologizing, encouraging and teasing in the same breath. Making mistakes and learning. Maybe this was what it meant to be human. Maybe he still held a chance at his humanity. Maybe he was beginning to care about these humans.

The smallest of smiles creeps onto Seungmin's lips and he hides it in the crook of Jeongin's neck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is just a little reprieve after all that drama, but maybe it might come back again *^* who knows  
> Thank you very much for taking your time to read again, and I'll see you next chapter <3


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And thank you again to all the wonderful readers that helped this to reach 4k+ hits, thank you for giving this story attention and love and thank you for putting up with my dramatics and everything else I make you go through, I love you all <3  
> We're nearing the end of the story for real this time, and I really hope that you'll bear with me for that much longer ^^"  
> Without further ado, let's go into the chapter !

It took a lot to anger Chan. Felix tended to joke that he had the patience of a saint, putting up with all of them, and for the most part he agreed. It did take an awful lot of patience to handle the craziness that was his friend group although sometimes he’d follow the good old saying of ‘if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.’ But of course he had to be the sane one or someone would get hurt.

Apparently being the sane one still hadn’t prevented someone from getting hurt, and beyond whatever Chan could’ve imagined too. Chan frowns as he sets the last dish on the drying rack and hangs up his rubber gloves. It had taken him an unnerving amount of convincing to get the others to eat although they were normally the most gluttonous people he knew (that was a lie, he himself was the most gluttonous person he knew, seconded only by Felix). Seungmin had forgone food altogether, and nothing he did could convince the boy to eat.

Chan felt useless in those moments, unable to hold himself together in front of Seungmin in the morning, and then unable to comfort them throughout the day. There were few things that he couldn’t abide more than the empty feeling of knowing that whatever he tried to do made little difference.

He moves into one of the bedrooms and sees Jeongin preparing to slip into bed. Chan would’ve expected Felix to be with Changbin in the moment, but to his surprise he finds the blonde with their youngest, throwing a leg and an arm over him and pulling the blankets over the both of them. The cute little scene does make Chan smile slightly, but it dissipates when he sees that neither of them are smiling.

Felix glances up at Chan and he flashes him a lacklustre salute. “Hey, Chris,” he calls, his voice riddled with tiredness. Chan makes his way over to the pair and messes with the blonde's hair before straightening it out with his fingers.

“Hey, Lix, how’re you going?”

Felix sighs and rolls over, freeing Jeongin from the confines of his arms and legs. The youngest rolls over as well to look at Chan and something inside of the older man cracks when he sees the glassy, almost lost look in Jeongin’s eyes. Everyone knew that Jeongin had a special spot in him for Hyunjin, and hearing the news must have crushed him.

“I dunno, Chris,” Felix mumbles, his voice rumbling as he measures his words. “It’s...been a lot. Don’t even think it’s sunk in fully yet. I just...Hyunjin? My Hyunjin? Gone?” Felix swallows thickly. “That’s not right, Chris. It can’t be. He’s like a cockroach, the apocalypse can literally happen and he’d be crawling around perfectly fine.”

“Maybe he’s not really gone,” Jeongin whispers, and despite his words, his voice sounds so utterly hopeless. “Maybe he’s just...somewhere.”

Chan reaches over to mess with Jeongin’s hair. “Whatever happened and whatever is going to happen from now on, we’re going to get through it,” he tells them, keeping his voice firm. “I know that Hyunjin wouldn’t want to see either of you moping around.”

“Well Hyunjin can kiss my ass,” Felix huffs. “I’m gonna feel sad about it whether he likes it or not.”

Jeongin giggles slightly at that and Chan rolls his eyes. “...that’s the spirit, I guess?”

Felix throws his arms around Jeongin again and shifts to constrain him with his body. “Why him though?” he murmurs slowly. “It’s not Seungmin’s fault...I get that, but…” Felix hides his face in the nape of Jeongin’s neck. “I just want to blame him. I want to agree with Changbin hyung and say that it’s his fault and that if Hyunjin had never met him then maybe things would’ve been different.”

Chan just watches the blonde with a soft sigh. He sees Jeongin swiping at his eyes and he crouches down at the bedside, eyeing the pair. “Blaming someone makes you feel better in the short term,” he tells them gently. “It’s normal. But whether it’s his fault or not, he’s just as affected by this as we are if not more. He had to witness it himself. I just…” Chan averts his eyes, his forehead creasing. “I wish I was there to help him—” He shakes his head. “It’s all right to feel like that, Lix.”

Jeongin meets his eyes, his face drawn and tired, and Chan can’t help the urge to tousle his hair again and rub his cheek. Normally, Jeongin would’ve flinched away with a complaint, but this time he barely reacts. “Hyung, I don’t care whose fault it is, I just want Hyunjin hyung back.”

Chan nods and stands up. “We all do, Innie,” he tells him. “But for now, the most we can do is ensure that we keep ourselves in good health.” He offers them both a smile. “You two go get some rest, all right?” He tugs on the bedside lamp, shutting that off before heading to the door and flipping the lightswitch there too. “Night.”

Heavy-hearted, Chan makes his way to the next room, hesitating before he knocks and slowly pushes it open. He sighs when he sees the lump on the bed, wrapped in a thick comforter with only a head popping out from it. He steps over to the bedside and sits down beside Seungmin, whose eyes are dreadfully wide and who is very clearly shaking. He reaches out to touch one of Seungmin’s hands, curled around the comforter to keep it pulled around himself, his eyes widening when he feels how cold the brunette is to touch. “Seungmin!”

The young man meets his gaze and shakes his head. “I’m fine,” he insists although he doesn’t look fine in the slightest.

Chan shakes his head. “You’re freezing.”

“Cold blood,” Seungmin dismisses, shaking his head again. Chan purses his lips and hurries out of the room to the kitchen to grab a glass of hot water, returning to Seungmin’s side and pressing it into his hands. He sees the boy relax slightly, his fingers instinctively curling around the warmed glass, although he can still see him shivering. Chan reaches out and touches Seungmin’s neck, making the boy flinch, but Seungmin doesn’t move away. He can feel the flaps of skin on Seungmin’s neck and they feel rather odd, but he wasn’t about to judge.

“Make sure you get some rest, all right?” Chan meets Seungmin’s eyes again, and he sees a tint of silver in them which makes him shiver, reminding him of when he had been dragged into the sea and quite nearly suffered the same fate as Hyunjin, but he doesn’t move his hands away in his discomfort, understanding that Seungmin lost heat quickly.

“I’ll try,” Seungmin murmurs. “Thank you.”

Chan tilts his head and offers Seungmin a reassuring smile. “I know it’s probably hard for you to understand our behaviour sometimes and I know you’re blaming yourself,” he informs slowly. “But it’s not your fault. You didn’t know either.” Chan takes Seungmin’s head in his hands, making the brunette meet his eyes. “This is a product of situation. You couldn’t have changed it. But you can determine who you are. Don’t let your situation tell you what you should be.”

He lowers his hands from Seungmin’s head and offers him an altruistic smile. “You don’t have to blame your siren and you don’t have to hate your human. You’re Seungmin. You’re not one or the other, you’re you. You’re the person that Hyunjin fell for, and it wasn’t because you were siren or because you were human with a dark past. He fell for you because you’re Seungmin.” Chan nods. “So just keep being Seungmin. Don’t ever think that if you were or weren’t like this, then things would’ve been different.”

Surprise shines in Seungmin’s silvery eyes and Chan chuckles, reaching up to ruffle the brunette’s hair. “We’re stronger together than we are alone. We’ll get through this together. It might take a while and have twists and turns, but we’ll get through this together.” He sees tears welling up in Seungmin’s eyes and he shakes his head, reaching up to swipe at them before they can fall. “Don’t go crying on me now,” he huffs, pursing his lips. “If you cry, I’ll cry too and I’ll look like even more of a vampire than I already do.”

Seungmin’s lips are pursed at that, but Chan can see them curling up slightly at the corners and it makes him chuckle. “If you need anything else, just let me know, but I share a room with Bin, so make sure you don’t wake him up if he’s sleeping.” He stands up and pulls the comforter away from Seungmin’s head so that it sits draped over his shoulders and wrapped around his frame in all it’s fluffed up glory. “You get some sleep. You’ve had a long day.”

He leaves the room and leaves the brunette dumbfounded in the room, but he barely notices.

His final destination leaves him feeling drained and as much as he needed to get the ideas swarming around his mind onto a file, he couldn’t help but feel the urge to just lie down and try to sleep for once, and when he enters his room and sees Changbin, arms crossed over his chest and sitting obtrusively between him and his desk, he realizes that trying to work probably wouldn’t go too well with the shorter man.

“Hey…?”

“I realize how wrong this can sound out of context, but bed. Now.” Changbin cocks an eyebrow at him as though waiting for him to argue and he tilts his head slightly, a sharp glint in his eyes.

“Well, you’re definitely right about that sounding wrong out of context, my dear friend whom I love very much.” He takes a challenging step towards the younger man who remains adamantly planted to his seat. “But you of all people should know not to mess with inspiration.”

“You’re not inspired,” Changbin states bluntly, causing Chan’s eyes to widen at the audacity, and under any other context this might have been at least remotely comedic, but he didn’t appreciate the certain Changbin-shaped wall that was standing between him and his laptop.

He crosses his arms. “Why wouldn’t I be?” he asks slowly.

“Because,” Changbin begins, his voice losing its edge and his gaze growing slightly worried. “You don’t have that look you normally do when you’re genuinely inspired to do something. You’ll probably just sit and stare at your screen and do nothing for the next four hours minimum. Tell me I’m wrong, but you’re looking for a distraction.”

“You’re saying that like I’m about to do something illegal,” Chan remarks with a mirthless laugh.

Changbin just shrugs. “Illegal maybe not, but definitely still bad for your health. You’re going around telling everyone to rest and then working yourself to the bone. I’m not moving until you go to bed.”

“This should be categorized as cruel and unusual punishment,” Chan huffs, but turns to grab himself some clothes for sleeping anyway. He hides the slight fond smile on his face with a more neutral expression, although despite his frustrations he secretly appreciated the fact that Changbin was willing to grate on his nerves for his own good. It was the kind of small thing that Chan would never take for granted although he would never admit it out loud either.

“What you do to yourself sometimes should be categorized as cruel and unusual punishment,” Changbin retorts, and Chan snorts at that. He quickly changes and then hops onto the bed, bouncing on the mattress before crossing his own arms over his chest and staring at Changbin. “Now you go get ready to sleep,” he tells him. “I solemnly swear to not touch my laptop.” This seems to placate the man who removes himself from the chair and heads to the bathroom to wash up.

Chan's eyes drift over to his desk and he's tempted to make his great escape to it, but before he can budge an inch, the bathroom door opens and he's met with a pair of narrowed eyes. “Don't even think about it,” Changbin calls, and Chan just pouts childishly.

“Too late,” he retorts, earning himself an unimpressed look.

Nonetheless, he does end up remaining on the bed and as Changbin clambers in with him, he easily shifts to share with the man. He rolls over to face him and turns down the light of the bedside lamp to a dim glow. “The kids are taking it really roughly,” he sighs. “I'm worried about them.”

“You worry too much,” Changbin responds, his eyes already closed and his arms wrapped around Gyu. “We're all taking it roughly, but like you always say, we'll get through it together.” Chan sighs, and at that, Changbin opens his eyes. “Hyung, you're doing all you can for them. They're doing their best to cope. Don't neglect your own self-care because you're so focussed on them.”

Chan shakes his head. “I'm not.”

“Maybe not yet, but you have to remember that to help them you have to be healthy.” Changbin stares at him seriously. “You may be the oldest out of all of us, but you've got us as much as we've got you. Together means all of us, not just us and then you.”

Chan chuckles faintly, a soft, dry sound. “I'm supposed to be the one helping you out, not the other way around.”

“Shut up and take my therapy session, hyung.”

Chan actually does laugh at that and shakes his head. “Yeah, yeah. But actually though, how are you feeling?”

“I'm not sure,” Changbin admits honestly, closing his eyes again. “I was frustrated towards Seungmin earlier. Even after I said what I did. But now I don’t know what to feel. I think I just want to see Hyunjin again. Dead, alive, it doesn’t matter. I just want to see his face again. I never thought that I wouldn’t see him again.” Changbin sighs and wipes at his eyes absently. Despite the dim lighting, Chan can see the glimmer of tears trickling over his knuckles. “I should’ve taken things more seriously after what happened with you and Lix.” Changbin’s jaw tightens. “I don’t want anything else to happen to anyone else.”

Chan nods in understanding. “Yeah…” he sighs and shakes his head.

“Now be quiet and get some rest, hyung.”

Chuckling, Chan nods and moves to shut off the lights entirely, pulling the blankets over them. He closes his eyes and soon the sounds of Changbin’s snoring, muffled by his face in his Munchlax plush. Chan smiles slightly to himself and shifts just a little closer to the younger man, watching him silently although it was difficult to see him in the dark.

He was glad that the man was able to go to sleep with ease, although it seemed as though that just wouldn’t be the case tonight for him. His active mind just refused to give his exhausted body a rest, and Chan found himself trapped in yet another insomnia-induced conundrum; he had promised that he wouldn’t touch his laptop, but really he wanted to do nothing more than pore over the comfort of arrangements and compositions at the moment. Unfortunately, he was a man of his word, so that wasn’t an option right now.

With a tired huff, he throws off the blanket and sits up, tensing slightly when he hears Changbin mutter under his breath, but after a few moments of stillness, he assures himself that the man is still asleep. He lifts himself to his feet, wincing as the mattress creaks with the movement. He quietly slips out of the room and pads through the hall before making his way out and onto the porch.

It was a picturesque night with the clear, star-strewn sky and nearly full moon, the waves glittering under the pale light and licking at the paler sand. Chan just sits himself down on the porch and soaks in the sight, drawing in a slow breath and tasting the sea air on his tongue. He smiles slightly to himself, closing his eyes as a wavering breeze ruffles his curly hair, a gentle caress against his tumultuous mind. He leans back, his weight resting on the heels of his hands and sighs.

It probably wasn’t safe to be outside, but Chan needed to clear his mind. Being indoors was being entrapped in a whirlwind of thoughts that seemed to mix with those of the others and really, Chan just felt more relaxed out here despite the risks it may entail.

He breathes out slowly and stands, padding out over the pathway that led down to the beach, and just walks along the white sands, not moving too close to the water for the sake of safety. Changbin had told him to stay healthy, and not drowning again sounded healthy to him. He could never be too sure what was in the water now. He sighs and stares out over where the waves lapped at the sky in the diamond-speckled horizon. Hyunjin was out there somewhere.

He frowns. If only he could see him again, that was all Changbin wanted. He could tell that it was difficult for the man to even get those words out. And then there was Felix, Jeongin and Seungmin to worry about too. The trio weren’t even that much younger than him, but his protective instincts just burst into view whenever it came to Felix and Jeongin, and now Seungmin too, who looked no older than them.

It frustrated Chan to know that he couldn’t do a thing for them. That he hadn’t done anything for Hyunjin. That he didn’t make any attempt to avoid this kind of situation although he had thought that he did. He had only told them to not leave the house, uncaring as to whether there were any factors that could loop through that obstacle like Woojin’s knowledge of his identity and his name had. Chan’s eyes widen slightly and he looks over the waters again, rolling steadily over the shore.

That’s right, they were still there as well. Somewhere beneath the waves. Chan shudders, and suddenly a current of irritation floods over him, raising goosebumps on his skin. They were skulking there like cowards after what they had done. His brow knits and he stares out over the dark water. If the siren could call his name and somehow reach him, it might be a stretch but surely he himself could do the same, right? Chan sucks in a deep breath. “Woojin!”

His voice echoes over the empty expanse and he feels the blood rush to his ears from embarrassment. He should’ve realized that something so stupidly stretched couldn’t possibly happen. He breathes out slowly and continues to walk along the shore, feeling oddly at unrest.

“Yes?”

Chan tenses at the sound of the voice, oddly melodious although it was only spoken and dreadfully familiar. He feels himself grow suddenly cold as he turns to face the waters again only to find a figure lounging half within the waves and half on the sand, the moonlight sharpening his already sharp yet somehow soft features and toned body. He stands there, frozen stiff for a few moments.

“Woojin…” he murmurs slowly, finally acquainting the voice with a face for the first time. His vision blurs slightly and he darts forward, dropping down and grabbing the man by the shoulders, not even caring for their proximity as his eyes darken. “You killed Hyunjin,” he rasps. “You killed him.” His eyes are wide and suddenly all the bottled emotional turmoil that had been trapped inside of him for the sake of his friends bubbles up and boils over. His hands grip Woojin's shoulders ruthlessly, his gaze bordering hysteric. “You killed Hyunjin!”

“Chan—”

Chan shakes his head. “What, what do you want now, are you going to kill me too? Well, go ahead, just don't touch the kids,” he grits out. “Don't you dare lay a finger on them.”

“Chan—”

“Hyunjin! He didn't do anything wrong. He laughs at everything and is scared of everything and is too kind to harm a fly, and— and you killed him!” Chan's voice lowers and quiets hoarsely. He stares Woojin in the eyes. “I'll never forgive you if you hurt any of the others. You nearly drowned me, that's fine. But your little friends went and nearly drowned Felix—”

 

“Chan!”

 

The man freezes when his own shoulders are gripped by Woojin's large hands, the long nails scraping his skin slightly and snapping him back to his senses and the potential direness of the situation. His eyes widen when he realizes that he's quite literally put himself in a precarious position, but finds that he can't move away as Woojin stares right through him again. He tenses again when he sees the man eyeing him so intensely. It made him feel as though the layers of mettle that he had carefully built up over the course of his life were being stripped away piece by piece.

 

He wasn't used to feeling vulnerable.

 

“Wh-what do you even want with us?” He murmurs, his voice low, barely audible as he stares straight back into Woojin's golden eyes that fixated him to place. The water licked at his sandals, but the tides weren't rising and there was no sign that they would be moving, so he didn't feel as panicked as he otherwise would have.

“Chan we had no choice. We were puppets being controlled. We knew the consequences but we couldn't do anything about it.”

Chan's fist makes contact with Woojin's shoulder, although not hard enough to be considered a real strike. His head falls and he grits his teeth tightly. “That's no excuse,” he hisses. “Why did it have to be him?” The man's voice seethes with despair. “He's harmless and he really loved Seungmin with all his heart, why did you have to kill him?” Chan swallows back a sob. “How could you hurt them so badly? How could you hurt Changbin and Felix and Jeongin— how could you hurt Seungmin? Wasn't he one of you?”

“Chan…”

“Why don't you hurt me too, huh? I'm right here.” Chan grabs Woojin's hand and presses it to his own neck, his eyes glazed with angry, unshed tears and a look that dared the man to clamp down. “If that'll satisfy your bloodthirst then just kill me too. If that means you won't hurt my friends then do it.” He glares unsparingly at the grey-tailed man. “Go ahead, why don't you?” His pulse races beneath Woojin's hand, dripping with seawater. He can feel the power rippling beneath the man's skin and knows full well that he could very well have his neck cleanly snapped in that moment if the siren wanted it.

 

“I won't.”

 

Chan's eyes widen as the hand moves away from his neck and he stiffens. “Then what do you want?” He asks, raising his voice to be heard above the beating of the waves, his voice shaking slightly in his attempts to control his raging emotions that told him to take out his fears and frustrations on the siren in the form of a few well thrown hits. “Why can't you just leave us alone? What do you want with us?”

 

“Chan.”

 

Chan forgets to breathe for a moment when he feels the enveloping sensation of arms around him and it's such a strange feeling, but Woojin is both broad and well-proportioned enough to actually give off the feeling of enveloping and Chan, despite himself, can't help but just melt down then and there. He can't believe himself, suddenly just losing control of his own lucidity in front of someone who both had tried to kill him before and was a practical stranger, but that was precisely what happened.

It should've been uncomfortable, Woojin being...part shark...and drenched from having just emerged from the sea, but it isn't. It's the most comforting embrace that Chan has felt in a while and he finds himself just muffling his sobs against the siren's chest, his fists pounding weakly against Woojin's back every now and then as everything just came pouring out after simmering beneath the surface for so long now.

He hated this, hated being unable to do anything, hated that he needed to be the one that was being helped by the last person he would want to be helped by. If Chan had felt pathetic for being unable to help the younger boys with this situation, he certainly felt pathetic now.

“Hey, Chan,” Woojin's voice is calm and soothing. “It's all right to feel angry.” Funny how it had been Chan saying those words beforehand, and now they were being spoken right back to him. He swallows and sobs, his salty tears making his face redden and turn blotchy. His fingers grapple at Woojin's shoulders again for purchase as though it would help ground him. It doesn't, but Woojin's hands are rubbing circles on his back and that brings the blood back through his body.

“Why are you like this?” He whispers. “Why are you doing this? What do you want?”

“I want to make things right,” Woojin tells him softly, his voice gentle as though speaking to a frightened fawn. “And I'm sure our Minho and Jisung want to do the same as well.” He lets his hand slow to a stop on Chan's dorsal, the weight of his touch firm. “There's a change in the waves. There's been a change in our Seungmin. We feel different.”

Chan pauses to gather himself, wiping at his reddish eyes with the back of his hand. “How do you make things right?” He asks, sounding almost defeated. “Our Hyunjin is gone, our maknaes are devastated and I— I can't do anything to help them and neither can you.” Chan stares at him blankly. “I don't care what kind of ability you have, you can't bring back the dead. No one can.” He slowly stands up, extricating himself from Woojin's grip. “You're not omnipotent. There's nothing you can do to redeem what you did.” He stares down at the siren, feeling oddly cold. “Nothing can compensate for Hyunjin. You took away someone that's worth more than everything to us.”

He turns and walks away from the siren, leaving a pair of golden eyes piercing silently into his back. He reenters the bedroom and quietly shifts beneath the sheets, closing his eyes and somehow falling asleep near immediately. He entirely misses Seungmin, who had been watching silently, skulking in the shadows created by the porch lights. The brunette bites his lip and retreats back indoors, but not before exchanging a long, silent look with the pair of shining eyes that catch his own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love Chan so much ;-;  
> I don't have much else to say right now, so until next time <3


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again to everyone who has continued to support this, it really does mean a lot <3  
> Now I've seen theories going on in the comments and I'd just like to say that you all are very intuitive~ I'm impressed, but I won't say anything more, now on with the chapter !

“Wooj, hey, Wooj, I think I felt a heartbeat!”

The siren immediately darts away from his niche in the giant coral, tail curving powerfully behind him as he approaches Jisung, whose ear is laying against Hyunjin’s chest, pressed up against his tattered shirt. The man is resting bound to a softer section of the yellowish coral, his face drawn and pale, paler in the muted light that could reach the floor of the shallow bed.

Woojin nods slowly and glances up towards the surface. “He’s a special one, that’s for sure.”

Jisung raises his head, his blue hair floating slowly in the water like a halo around his head until it comes to a rest. He shrugs, beating his tail against the coral and leaning his weight back on the heels of his hands. “Minnie’s gonna be happy about it.” he muses before suddenly darting off and swimming a circle around Woojin, his eyes glittering. “Can I tell him? I should tell him, he’s probably moping his head off.”

Woojin’s eyes drift over to Hyunjin’s still frame and he reaches out to feel for his heartbeat. “No,” he responds simply. “Don’t.”

Jisung frowns. “Why not? Wooj, he was crushed when Minho killed the kid.”

Woojin draws a long nail through the scabbed lines on Hyunjin’s neck, reopening them and allowing the blood to flow out and into the salty water. “Look at him, Jisung, he looks like he’s dead. He’ll probably die if you move him around anyway.”

“So? We can bring Minnie here,” Jisung points out. “He can swim and breathe underwater too.”

Woojin stares at his fingers, which are stained with blood again and he waits for the gentle currents to whisk away the crimson coloured substance before turning to face Jisung again. “Yes, but Hyunjin’s friends will worry too, and I doubt any of them can hold their breath long enough to reach down here and then swim up again without drowning.”

“Who cares about them?” Jisung interjects impatiently.

“Our Seungmin apparently.” Woojin smiles slightly as he stares down at Hyunjin, whose body remains more or less unreactive to his actions. If anything, the man may as well have been a corpse. Woojin settles down beside Hyunjin. “We’re not even doing anything this time.”

Jisung purses his lips. “I dunno about you, but I don’t particularly like them,” he admits, lifting himself upright and crossing his toned arms over his chest. “I don’t want to kill them or anything, don’t get me wrong, but—” his eyes narrow slightly, “what if they actually do end up hurting him?”

“It’s a risk he’s willing to take,” Woojin responds. “And if it backfires, we’ll always be here for him, right?”

“Yeah...but what if the hate comes back?” Jisung voices slowly, his voice quieting. “Wooj, I don’t want to be caught in that again. Not having control over ourselves is awful.”

His silvery tail beats down on the coral as Woojin launches himself off of it and moves to rest a comforting hand on Jisung’s shoulder. “Only the future can tell,” he replies. “And we can’t tell the future. Let’s worry about it when it arrives.” He offers the blue-haired siren a smile. “We know that he’s different now. We need to trust him.”

 

“Trust who?!”

 

Woojin is quick to dart away from Jisung just as the younger is bowled over by a certain leopard-tailed siren, sending both of them somersaulting off and leaving in their wake a multitude of plants strewn about the water. Woojin moves forward to pluck the plants out of mid-water before they got any more damaged than they already were.

“Yah! You’re blinder than a fangtooth, I was right there, how do you not see me!” Jisung yelps, disentangling himself from Minho.

“Well maybe if you didn’t have the reflexes of a sunfish you would’ve gotten out of the way! I wasn’t after you, I was after Woojin anyway,” Minho retorts smartly, huffing and wiping plant fragments off the gills on his tail.

“Senile, crusty nautilus,” Jisung huffs.

“Senile yourself, you sea snail,” Minho bites back.

“You're older than me, dumbass.”

The pair glare at each other for a good minute before Minho breaks first and his lips split into a grin. “Miss me?” He croons, swimming a circle around Jisung and messing with his hair, an affectionate glint in his eyes when the blue strands halo around Jisung's head for a few moments again.

Jisung's shoulders relax and he grins mischievously. “Maybe~” he singsongs, only to receive an offended look from the green-eyed siren.

“Wow, all right, I'll stay at the algae gardens longer. The sharks are less of seasnakes than you.” Minho crosses his arms over his chest and swims over to Woojin, who inspects the plants that he had salvaged critically.

The golden-eyed siren, who had barely batted an eyelid at the very vocal exchange tears a bite off of one of the ruffles of algae and swallows it. “I wonder if there's a way to feed him,” he hums, his eyes drifting over to Hyunjin. “He loses weight quickly, but he's not capable of eating right now.”

“That's on him,” Minho replies breezily, swimming to Hyunjin's side and peering down at him. “Maybe infusion? Is he breathing yet?”

“Not yet,” comes the response. “At this rate he may be in a few hours though.”

Despite his nonchalant words, Minho checks thoroughly over Hyunjin, running his fingertips along the folds of skin over his neck and listening for his heartbeat and any sign of breathing. He traces Hyunjin's bruises and rubs them slightly, but receives no reaction from the man. When he satisfies himself, he moves away. “Our Seungminnie must have loved him a lot,” he remarks, rolling over in the water and staring at Woojin upside down, his eyes glinting in the muted light.

“Minnie could've done so much better,” Jisung huffs. “I mean look at this guy's mug.”

“You're just jealous that he's prettier than you, Sungie,” Minho chirps audaciously, giggling at his own words and earning himself a wide-eyed and very much offended look from the bronze-tailed siren.

“Him? Prettier than me? Look at his face!” Jisung sputters.

Minho nods with a devilish, toothy grin on his face, crinkling his catlike eyes. “Look, he has dimples!” he chirps, making his way gracefully over to Hyunjin and curling beside him. “And pretty, full, _kissable_ lips and these moles—” Jisung sulks and Minho chuckles, pushing himself off of the coral to circle around blue-haired siren. “You’re cute when you want attention,” he laughs.

“Nope, I don’t need your attention, I’m a strong, independent siren who don’t need no seasnake like you,” the younger states huffily, turning his back to Minho and crossing his arms over his chest.

Minho rests his chin on Jisung’s shoulder, looping his arms around his thin waist. “Come on, Sungie, you love me,” he sings, still grinning. For a few moments, he receives no response, but then the blue-haired siren whips around and leans forward, pecking him on the lips.

“You’re lucky I do, ugly,” Jisung responds, his voice affectionate despite his words.

“And you call me the blind one,” Minho jokes in turn.

Jisung smirks. “Because you are, dumbass.”

Minho rolls his eyes and pushes Jisung away, although not hard. “Seasnake.”

Woojin clears his throat, suddenly rising beside them with a cocked eyebrow. “If you’re done, could you go down and see if you can harvest the stones, Jisung. You’ll have all the time in the world to flirt later.” He grins slightly at the appalled look on Jisung’s face, but the bronze-tailed siren whips around and heads out into deeper water anyway without too much complaint.

“He’s so _messy_ ,” Minho complains as soon as the siren is out of earshot, turning to face Woojin.

Woojin only shrugs. “Your problem and not mine,” he dismisses cordially with a chuckle.

“I’m so glad I have a supportive friend like you,” Minho drawls sarcastically.

“You should be, I’m the one that listens to your complaining,” Woojin easily responds, returning to Hyunjin’s side and sitting down comfortably beside him, stretching and pressing the red algae that Minho had brought into flat sheets.

Minho shrugs and swims a circle, suspending himself upside down in front of Woojin again. “Respect to you for that, Woojin,” he hums, completing the circle and hanging upright again. “Are you really sure he’ll survive?” he asks after a few moments, his eyes darting over to Hyunjin, still pale, still limp, but grasping on to the string of a chance at life that he had. “I don’t want to be the harbinger of doom or anything, but Woojinnie, he looks like he could die if you drop a sand dollar on him.”

“The fact that his heart is even beating already vouches for how desperate Seungmin is to see him again,” Woojin replies calmly. “And from what I’ve seen, Hyunjin looks at our Seungmin the same way you look at Jisung.”

“With disgust and annoyance?” Minho quips.

“You know what I mean,” Woojin replies, barely batting an eyelid. “I’m sure that, if there’s any chance that they can be by each other’s sides again, both of them will make every effort to do just that.” He glances over at Hyunjin, whose lips have parted slightly. “See? He’s already breathing. Sooner than even I expected.”

Minho draws closer to them, his eyes glinting as he watches Hyunjin, the raw folds of skin working as water passes through them. He blinks and lowers his head closer.

 

“Seu..ng..m..”

 

The voice is somewhat reedy, thin, lacking in substance and barely audible to begin with, fading away at the end. Hyunjin’s eyes don’t open, neither does he move, but Minho lifts his head and chuckles, turning to eye Woojin, who watches the man silently. “Maybe he will be fine,” he agrees.

“Maybe,” Woojin agrees, his eyes seeming to brighten as he glances down at Hyunjin, who neither speaks or moves any more. He pushes himself up and hands the sheet of red algae to Minho. “Do me a favour and finish this,” he tells him. “When you’re done, treat his bruises.”

“Sure, make me do everything,” Minho huffs, but takes it anyway and begins to press it. “What’re you off to do?”

“Just checking up on some things.”

“Watch out for nets.”

Woojin nods and propels himself away, through the water, rising closer to the surface. He pauses just a few feet beneath it and stares up at the dancing sunlight before breaking through and throwing his head back, slicking his hair out of his face with his fingers. Breathing in slowly, he turns to face the distant shore, his eyes narrowing to focus.

He ducks under the water again and swims towards the shoreline, slowing to a stop only when he scrapes the floor with his hands and sitting up in the shallow waves. He stares out towards the seaside home, listening carefully. When he sees a head of dark hair turn to stare out the window, he meets a pair of dark eyes set in pale skin. For a few moments the other man just freezes and stares at him before he turns, ducks beneath the waves again and swims off.

What it was about that man, he wasn’t quite sure. For nearly a century he had acquainted humans with destruction, selfishness and greed. Long before Seungmin had entered their lives, Woojin had retreated from any human contact, not having wanted anything to do with them. These humans were different. Woojin was used to the kinds of humans who would do nothing but harm his kind and his ecosystem in their thirst for knowledge and power. These humans were nothing like those.

Of course he had first come to see this with Hyunjin, who didn’t seem to have any kind of ulterior motive other than to become a companion to their Seungmin, who had been raised and treated as one of them ever since his rescue. Past the cloud of inevitable ire that was stirred up within himself and doubtless Jisung and Minho as well, there was a curiosity. Hyunjin acted like a child, amazed at the smallest things, sensitive and innocently kind.

Not that it had changed his fate anyway, considering any humans that tried to come close to Seungmin would need to be killed. Though he wasn’t exactly dead at the moment, so maybe it had made a difference.

But Woojin had never seen anyone like this man whom he had first attempted to drag down to a watery grave. He had never seen someone who had blatantly offered to die if it meant that his friends would be fine. It was beyond Woojin’s understanding of humans, and to say the least, it had both shocked and intrigued him. It was the polar opposite of everything that he had attributed to a human. 

He finds himself swimming in slow circles at the mid-depth water, lost in his thoughts. He catches himself and turns to head back to Minho, feeling slightly guilty for leaving him alone to do his work as well as watch over Hyunjin. However, when he returns, he find Jisung, arms wrapped around the leopard-tailed siren from behind, helping him press the brachial strands into a woven kind of sheet, every now and then pausing to pepper his neck and shoulders with the occasional kiss. Minho mutters the intermittent complaint about distractions here and there, but clearly makes no move to push the younger away.

Woojin chuckles softly to himself and rolls his eyes, shifting out of sight and turning to swim away, leaving the two to themselves and hoping for Hyunjin’s sake that the man doesn’t regain his consciousness anytime soon.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

“How did you know I would be here?” Woojin doesn’t even bother turning his head as he beats his tail against the face of the small crag, sending a sprinkling of salty droplets across the sand. His frame cuts a deep shadow in the sparsely lit night, much of the stars and the moon fully obscured by looming clouds that spoke of rain.

“You looked like you wanted to talk.”

Woojin finally turns to stare at the pale man, unsurprisingly clad in black. “And you’d willingly come out here in the dead of night knowing full well who I am and what I’ve done to ‘talk’?” he asks calmly, his gaze trailing over his figure.

Chan just settles down comfortably on the sand, kicking one knee up and resting his arm on it. He stares up at Woojin. “You had to listen to me, why shouldn’t I listen to you?” he reasons.

Woojin just chuckles and props his arm up on his lap, resting his chin on his hand, staring down at the man with his gaze seeming all the brighter in the darkness. “You’re a strange one, aren’t you?” He smiles slightly. “Very curious.”

The man doesn’t flinch at the intensity of his stare. If anything, he has to give him credit for being able to hold his gaze for so long in near complete silence. It was clear that he was on quite another level when he was fully composed, which made Woojin wonder just how much must have been running through his mind when he had first screamed out his name in frustration.

“Strange?” Chan suddenly breaks the silence, tilting his head slightly. “If that’s because of the last time, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to just pour everything on you. It probably doesn’t matter to you.”

Woojin purses his lips, but can’t help himself as they part slightly to reveal a sharp-toothed smile. “No, I’m interested,” he states. “First Hyunjin, and now you. You’re unlike all of the humans I’ve encountered in my lifetime.”

To say the least, Chan doesn’t look too amused, and Woojin can hardly blame him. “...the way you keep reiterating his name makes me think you have no respect for him at all,” he tells Woojin, his voice somewhat sharp. “If you wanted to mock him to my face, then I’m better off leaving.”

Ah...that was right. Chan wouldn’t know of Hyunjin’s current state. Woojin’s smile mutes itself and he sits up a little straighter, tilting his head down at Chan, his drenched hair drawing lines of seawater where it remained plastered to his skin. “Not at all,” he promises. “I do want to know how our Seungmin is doing. He hasn’t come back to us in days. We’re worried about him.” Stalling, of course. All of them knew that Seungmin was fine, but perhaps Woojin just needed to hear it from the man’s own mouth.

“Maybe he hasn’t come back because he can’t bear the sight of the ones that killed the person that he loves?”

And Woojin can’t help but wince at the scathing remark. He knows that they hurt Seungmin, perhaps unforgivably, but to hear it out loud stung. He looks down, expecting to see a spiteful look in the curly-haired man’s eyes, but instead he finds surprise and then remorse.

Chan frowns. “I— I shouldn’t be taking my frustration out on you. I’m sorry.” Woojin’s face must have mirrored the surprise he felt since Chan eyes him strangely. “...did I grow a second head or something..? Actually, nevermind, you’ve probably seen that before.” 

Woojin chuckles slightly at the remark and shakes his head. “No, no… you just surprised me,” he admits to him honestly.

“Surprised you? So I did grow a second head?” Chan actually does check to see if he had, much to Woojin’s amused surprise, and he wonders how else the man will surprise him as if he hadn’t been surprised enough within the past days.

“I assure you you’re still monocephalous,” Woojin insists, beating his tail against the rock face again. “I’m surprised because you apologized. You have every right to be angry at me. You don’t need to apologize to me. I would understand if you wanted to blame me.” He rests his head against his hand again. “But you apologized for venting your frustrations instead.”

Chan shakes his head. “It’s unreasonable for me to be angry at you. We were told that your behaviour was because you were being coerced under the hatred that Seungmin had developed for humans because of what had happened to him. Your own conscience isn’t guilty.” He meets Woojin’s eyes again. “But it’s really hard for me, as a human, to accept that because I don’t like things that I can’t understand.”

“I would never have thought you’d be so bothered by useless information like that,” Woojin replies candidly.

“It’s not useless.” Chan tilts his head up and squints slightly at Woojin. “I don’t know your history with humans, but you seem pretty cynical about us, although I can’t really judge, given we’re pretty cynical about your type too.” He shrugs. “You waited here. I’m not sure if you were even expecting me, but since I’m here, the least I can do is act like a half-decent person.”

Woojin laughs again, his eyes crinkling. His tail curls up and he shifts to lie with his stomach flat against the rock. He crosses his arms and rests his chin on them, eyeing Chan. “Curious, you’re very curious,” he hums. “You’re very different. You’re intriguing. Is this an act?”

“Is what an act?” Chan asks, his face contorting with puzzlement.

Woojin just nods in understanding. “Nothing.” He lets the silence flow smoothly for a few moments before speaking again. “Riddle me this: why do you talk so passionately about our Seungmin even though you haven’t known him for long and even though he’s so different from you humans?”

“Well, why did you save Seungmin although he was a human child?” Chan asks right back without missing a beat.

“Seungmin didn’t deserve what he had received. We needed to save him and protect him. He was only a child.”

Chan nods. “And he’s an adult now. Has your perspective of him changed?”

Woojin shakes his head, biting back the urge to smile again. “No, no it hasn’t.”

“Exactly. You didn’t know him, but you saved him because he needed saving. You still care about him although he’s different from you.” Chan smiles slightly. “He’s not like us, but that makes him unique. And he deserves to be cared for just as much as my other friends do. He feels and he hurts and he gets happy like all of us do. Just because he’s different doesn’t mean he deserves any less respect than any one of us.”

“I see.”

Chan stares up at Woojin. “He’s a friend of ours now too, and we’re going to treat him like one.”

The golden-eyed siren just nods silently, and doesn’t speak for another short while. He sits himself upright and stares down at Chan, as though debating on whether to speak. Finally, his lips part. “Tell me, how are you all doing?” he asks slowly. “After what all happened.”

“Picking up the pieces,” Chan responds reluctantly. “We’re getting there. It’s hard to get used to Hyunjin...not being there.” He quiets and looks down.

Woojin’s fingers curl over the edge of the rock and he pushes himself off of it, diving into the water in a single, lithe movement. He emerges and slicks his hair out of his face, meeting Chan’s eyes. “Thank you for taking care of our Seungmin,” he tells him. “Don’t forget to take care of yourself too.”

He ducks beneath the waves and swims away from the shore, leaving Chan behind. It takes him less than a minute to reach Hyunjin, being guarded by Jisung while Minho slept peacefully with his head in the siren’s lap. Woojin chuckles and slows to a stop in front of them. “You should go get some sleep yourself, Jisung,” he tells him. “I’ll take over. How’s he been?”

“He’s started mumbling more often. Mostly just saying names. I think I’ve heard Seungmin, Lix and Innie,” Jisung reports. He shrugs. “He’s recovering faster than I thought.”

Woojin nods and looks down at Hyunjin, reaching down to pick at the skin of his neck, ensuring they didn’t scab or scar. “Is he moving yet?”

“Not really. He has a pulse now and his chest is moving a little so he’s breathing. But other than that it’s just his mouth.” Jisung glances down at Hyunjin and shrugs. “I kind of feel bad for him.”

Woojin ruffles Jisung’s hair and the siren huffs as it forms a dark halo around his head. “Stop doing that—” Woojin only shakes his head and smiles before gently pushing at Jisung’s shoulder.

“Go and sleep somewhere more comfortable, and take Minho with you or he’ll complain about us peasants not taking proper care of him and letting him have his beauty sleep.”

“Peasant himself,” Jisung retorts. “Not like beauty sleep would help him anyway.”

“Because he’s already the epitome of beauty? Yes, we’re all aware, Jisungie, you’re head over tailfins for him, now go off and sleep,” Woojin chirps without even blinking. He sends the bronze-tailed siren away, sputtering like a faulty motor and carrying a curled up and peacefully sleeping Minho in his arms.

Woojin watches him retreat with an amused glint in his golden eyes. He settles down on the coral and glances down at Hyunjin again. “As for you, you're strange too,” he tells him, although Hyunjin likely wasn't even aware of his presence at the moment, and all the less likely to hear his voice. “You've changed our Seungmin.”

“S...eung..” Hyunjin's eyelashes flutter, “...mi..n…?” When Woojin catches a glimpse of the man's eyes, he nods slowly.

“No, you go back to sleep,” he tells him, resting a hand in his hair. “Rest and get well.” Woojin watches Hyunjin's eyes trace his frame, clearly unfocused and borderline delirious, and he just sings softly, running his fingers through Hyunjin's dark hair like he used to with Seungmin, and even further back in time, Minho and Jisung. It seems to do the trick as Hyunjin's eyes slowly close and the man slips off into another realm again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There aren't too many details here, bear with me ^^;  
> And someone really needs to convince me that minsung isn't the kind of couple who bickers about every tiny little thing but in reality love each other to bits—  
> Anyway ! Until next time <3


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you readers for 400+ kudos!! We're almost finished and I can never be able to say how grateful I am for everyone that's enjoyed reading this, thank you for making my day with your sweetness <3

Hyunjin isn't sure when he fully comes to consciousness. As his body slowly regained its functions one by one, he became a shell, able to open and close his eyes, move his mouth, but still too feeble to so much as sit up. His lips form brainless words, string together into thoughtless phrases, but his mind seemed to be slowly repairing itself as he gradually recovered his awareness at a painstaking pace.

He only truly recovers himself when he sees Jisung doing what appeared to be backflips far too fluidly and slowly to be doing it in air, and his eyes widen comically. “We're underwater!” He suddenly exclaims before slapping a hand over his mouth and coughing violently into it. He spits out blood with a grimace.

Jisung turns to stare at him blankly before whipping around. “Wooj, the kid's conscious again!”

“Yes, we're all aware—”

“No, conscious as in he has a personality!” Jisung clarifies obnoxiously, earning himself a glare, courtesy of a very, _very_ confused Hyunjin.

“That's more than I can say for you,” he retorts, pouting.

 

“Whoa there, feisty aren't you?”

 

Hyunjin shrieks and flops gracelessly around when he realizes for the second time that they are very much beneath the water's surface, meaning that his movements were oddly swaying around as he panics because for _how long_ had Minho been right beside him?! He squeaks and inches away when the leopard-tailed siren grins a sharp-toothed grin at him, and suddenly everything comes flooding back. He freezes.

Minho waves a hand in front of Hyunjin's blank face and glances back at Woojin. “Hey, I think we lost him again,” he calls.

Hyunjin shakes his head slowly before just slumping back to lie down against the plush coral, having exhausted himself with his own behaviour. He stares up at Minho, who just grins down at him, looking extremely amused, but also oddly friendly, and Hyunjin doesn't know what to make of it because the last time he saw that toothy smile, he is very sure that this siren was trying to erase his existence. Which he didn't appreciate, mind you.

“Uh— is this some kind of freak nightmare? Am I in some twisted kind of purgatory?” He asks weakly after a few moments of trying to comprehend just what the hell was going on. “I'm sorry for eating Felix's Tim Tam behind his back, I swear I'll get him another one—”

“Great, he's gone bonkers,” Jisung sighs.

Hyunjin’s brow creases. “Hey, if I had to wake up to see your face, I’d be well within my rights to think that I’ve gone bonkers too,” he defends.

“No, you haven’t gone...bonkers…” Woojin disclaims after a few moments of just watching the scene with an immense amount of patience. “Or at least I certainly hope you haven’t because that would be inconvenient for both us and Seungmin and your friends…”

“Seungmin!” Hyunjin suddenly gasps again, his eyes widening. He pushes himself off of the coral, temporarily forgetting that he was _underwater_ , but only remembering when his movements become painstakingly slow and dragged back by the current. He nearly sinks down then and there, with little strength to support himself, and instead stares imploringly at Woojin. “Is he okay? You didn’t do anything to him, right? He’s fine…?”

“Yes, knucklehead, he’s fine,” Jisung drawls, flicking the back of Hyunjin’s head (since when had he gotten there?) and inducing a whine from the man. “Now sit down before your brain ruptures or something. Assuming you have one.”

“Huh?”

“Looks like I had too much faith,” Jisung bites, a slight smirk creeping onto his lips.

Minho curls around Hyunjin and shifts to position himself between the two since it really did seem like they were on the verge of jumping each other, and in reality, that probably wasn’t a wise idea since Hyunjin could barely even _move_ without sinking to the ocean floor anyway. He pokes Jisung’s lips. “He only just regained his consciousness, you can’t expect him to be perfectly coherent.” In response, Jisung’s lips shift to kiss Minho’s finger. Not the rest of him, Hyunjin notices, just his lips.

“Sorry, baby,” Jisung chirps, not sounding very sorry.

Hyunjin looks from one to the other, and then down at himself. His skin has paled, and his bruises still remain a sickly purplish on his frame. He stretches out his fingers slowly and then balls them into a loose fist again. It feels odd, the slight drag from the surrounding water making his movements languid. He slowly reaches up to hold the tatters that were once his shirt; fortunately his shorts were still more or less in one piece.

Woojin approaches him, slinking gracefully through the water, and Hyunjin is immediately reminded of Seungmin, who had that peculiar, beautiful way of swimming. He stays still as Woojin looks over him, and frowns. “What's going on?” He asks, his voice a little calmer now that he's accepted the fact that he's currently underwater and _breathing._ “And is Seungmin really okay? Can I see him?”

“No, you can't,” Minho quickly cuts in, while Woojin doesn't make much attempt to steal the conversation back, too focussed on wrapping up Hyunjin's bruises in some weird, reddish thing that felt vaguely like leather.

Hyunjin turns to look at Minho, his brow furrowed. “Why not?”

“Because you're barely capable of anything right now. You can't even swim properly and your body is still getting used to this. You're probably going to end up hurting yourself if you try to go anywhere right now.”

“But—”

“Seungmin is fine. He's healthy and he's taking care of himself,” Woojin assures. “You need to do the same before you see him or it'll probably end badly.”

“I'm strong enough! I can go,” Hyunjin insists, only to have Minho's support behind him disappear. He loses the strength to even sit upright and just sways for a moment before falling back onto the coral. He pouts. “Fine.” He slowly sits himself up again, fingers brushing over the oddly spongy sea plant beneath him. “Why am I even alive? The last thing I remember was...I dunno, _drowning._ ”

“Hey, let’s not go around being passive aggressive,” Minho interjects, pinching Hyunjin’s ear between two of his long nails, causing a yelp to elicit from Hyunjin’s mouth. “That’s my job.”

“Ow!” Hyunjin whines. “I’m going to tell Minnie that you’re being mean to me.”

“Terrifying,” Minho drawls.

“You’re alive because of Seungmin,” Woojin tells him, deciding to interject before the rabbit-hole got a little too deep. When Hyunjin just stares at him in confusion, he flexes his fingers and points at Hyunjin, meeting his eyes. “We killed you. You were supposed to stay dead. But suddenly we didn’t feel that way anymore, and instead we felt the urge to find you and see if there was anything we could do.”

Woojin reaches out and tugs slightly at one of the flaps of skin on Hyunjin’s neck and he yelps, grabbing his neck. “Ow! That hurt—” His eyes widen as his fingers touch the odd, frill-like structures and he gasps, freezing still for the second time. “I— what are—” His eyes practically turn into saucers. “...gills..?”

“When we cut them in, you bled consistently although you had been dead for long enough for livor mortis to set in—” Hyunjin looks slightly green at that, but he just nods. Woojin doesn’t seem to notice his discomfort. “And that was a sign for us at least that there was some hope. We did nothing more than that though; we couldn’t do anything more because there was no catalyst. The reason you’re alive is because of Seungmin.”

“Our Seungminnie must love you a lot,” Minho chuckles. “We did nothing, but your heart started beating. Back then we did something to our Seungminnie, but we needed him in order for it to work. This time we cut your gills because we had a hope, but we weren’t the ones that saved you.”

“Maybe that’s what makes Min special,” Jisung remarks, barrel-rolling until he’s peering down at Hyunjin from an unsettlingly close proximity. “More than our magic, his emotions can make, break or manipulate whatever he wants without him realizing it.” He swims up, nearly whacking Hyunjin across the face with his bronze tail. “He’s more human than any of you will ever be.”

“So make sure you take care of our Seungminnie, all right?” Minho hums. “He’s really a kid at heart, but he loves you this much, so we have no choice but to let him go. He’s happy with you.”

Hyunjin just looks from one to the other, unable to quite process everything that he had been told. He touches his gills and frowns slightly. He closes his eyes momentarily, just trying to let it all sink in, but it doesn’t. So he just sighs and opens his eyes again. “I can’t really...comprehend it right now,” he states. “I just...I want to see Seungmin.”

Pouty as his words were, their information worried him. He knew that he should be happy that Seungmin returned his feelings, but he couldn’t help but wonder what that meant for the brunette. Was he grieving? He probably thought he was dead, and Hyunjin did want to go see him, but Woojin was right and he wasn’t healthy enough to move for long periods of time. He sighs and rubs his eyes, as though he had just woken up. “Is he really okay..? How about Chan hyung? Binnie hyung? Lix? Innie?”

“They’re all fine,” Woojin assures him. “What you should focus on right now is getting better yourself. The sooner you do, the sooner you can see them.”

“Right!” Hyunjin perks up at that, his eyes sparkling. “So, how do I get better? Can’t you guys just magic me better or something?”

“Not in that body, no,” Minho replies scathingly. “You’ll probably end up dead again.”

Hyunjin’s drooping must’ve been painfully visible because a bark of laughter escapes Jisung’s throat and the siren’s lips spread to reveal a pointy-toothed grin. The blue-haired siren swims up to him and he winces. “Don’t smile, you look terrifying.”

Jisung rolls his eyes. “Wow, this is the thanks we get for saving your ass?”

“Actually it was Seungmin—” Woojin interjects.

“ _Y_ _ou_ were swimming around screaming something about a corpse being in a hole in the bottom of the sea,” Minho adds dryly.

Jisung just crosses his arms over his chest and sulks. “If the human kids can do it, then so can I.”

Hyunjin just makes a face. “Why would you even do that? That’s messed up, man...siren...uh…”

“Jisung,” Minho suggests helpfully.

“Jisung,” Hyunjin repeats.  

A silence descends on them, broken only by a hollow sounding growl. Hyunjin jumps, his head whirling back so quickly he may as well have given himself whiplash even though he was underwater. He sees an amused glint in Minho’s eyes and he looks down as another noise permeates the water. His ears redden as he realizes what the source of the noise was. “Uh...so what do you guys eat?” He pats his stomach sheepishly.

 

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

  

In the span of the day, Hyunjin discovered that Jisung was the most obnoxious person he’s ever met, that Woojin is likely just as tired of everything as Chan is and that Minho would flirt with anything that had a pulse. He also probably ate the most variety of plants in the span of the last hour than he had in his entire life, some tasting weirdly sweet, some salty and others just tasting like...plants. The lack of meat had been dismissed with an excuse of him being unable to digest anything more at the moment which he grudgingly accepted.

He’s currently lying down boredly against the soft, giant coral, a string of some purplish kelp hanging from his lips as he chews lazily at it, wincing and grabbing at his gills every so often. They felt strange. They felt normal, but at the same time, didn’t. As though they belonged there, but understood that they shouldn’t. Breathing underwater came as naturally as breathing air, and Hyunjin sometimes forgot that the environment was different.

“Do they hurt?” Woojin asks him, looking up from where he’s doing something (Hyunjin couldn’t see from his vantage) at the foot of the coral. He frowns slightly.

“A little...it’s fine, it’s bearable.” The siren swims up, holding something a vibrant blue in his hands and Hyunjin twists to see the fish, his eyes widening. “It's a Dory fish!”

“It's a blue tang,” Woojin corrects, looking down at the fish that wriggles in his hands. “And it's injured itself.” He points to the abrasion near the caudal end of the fish. He rests his thumb over the injury and holds it there for a few moments before releasing the tang, letting it swim around him. Hyunjin laughs delightedly at the sight, noting in wonderment that the abrasion is gone.

“It's beautiful!” He exclaims Woojin shoos the creature towards Hyunjin and it swims around him curiously, bumping his shoulder with its muzzle, making him giggle and pat its head. Woojin smiles slightly at the sight.

“You look surprised. I'm sure you must have seen them at those...conservatories...that you humans keep sea life contained in..” his voice tightens.

Hyunjin glances up at him. “Aquariums? Yeah, we do.” He tilts his head. “But a lot of them take good care of the animals! Some of them don't…” he admits. “But most do! They keep the ones that wouldn't be able to survive by themselves in the wild.”

Woojin doesn't say much to that, and Hyunjin doesn't push the matter too much. He giggles again, his eyes crinkling into a happy smile when the bright creature bumps against his cheek. When he looks up, he sees a familiar look in Woojin's golden eyes, but he can't quite place a finger on it. He preoccupies himself with playing with the Dory fish (he much preferred that to blue tang), since he figures Woojin probably had better things to do than to supervise him.

“You're quite the interesting human.”

Hyunjin glances up and cocks his head, bemused. “What do you mean?”

“You're like a child.”

Hyunjin pouts and crosses his arms over his chest. “Okay, wow, and just when I thought there was someone nice down here,” he huffs.

Woojin chuckles. “Don't misunderstand, it's an interesting thing. You don't have greed.”

“Greed?” Hyunjin echoes.

Woojin nods. “Humans are exemplary for their greed. For everything. Power, knowledge, affection, attention, fame…” he shrugs. “You may call us monsters, but it's only because you don't want to look into the monstrosities that exist inside of you. Our Seungmin's humanity turned us into monsters because of his greed for revenge and safety and life. But you don't seem to have that greed in you.”

Hyunjin muses on the golden-eyed siren's words silently for a few moments before sitting himself upright. “I don't know how to see it the same way you do,” he admits. “Because I'm just a human, I've only seen things the way humans do. And I think that everyone is greedy including me.” He giggles. “I like attention, and I like affection. I like knowing things that other people don't and I want to be the best at things. I'm greedy too.” He shrugs. “It's just a part of being human. But I don't think that it makes me a bad person.” He tilts his head. “Everyone has their own monsters. But it doesn't make them bad.”

He toys with the hem of his shirt. “When we get older, we're forced to see things in grey and choose the lesser evil and make sacrifices that we don't want to. Everyone has grey, everyone has flaws and bad qualities, but everyone also has good qualities. Sometimes people nurture the bad qualities until they override the good ones, but the opposite is also true.”

Hyunjin glances up at Woojin again. “Seungminnie is just an extreme example. I still can't really believe that he's the reason I'm alive right now, but then again, he's also the reason he's alive too…” Hyunjin purses his lips.

Woojin swims closer to him and eyes him in silence until the intensity of his stare causes Hyunjin to shift away, slightly disconcerted. His lips part to reveal twin rows of sharp teeth. “Very interesting.” He chuckles. “I suppose my polarized opinions of humans have been outdated for long enough. You're never too old to learn new things.”

“You don't even look that old,” Hyunjin informs frankly.

“Hyunjin, I can assure you that I'm at least six times your age.”

“Wow, dermatologists must hate you.”

The confusion written on Woojin's face at his remark makes Hyunjin laugh until it tires him out and he lies down against the coral again, his eyes still crinkled with mirth. He closes his eyes. “So what do you even do down here in the ocean?” He asks.

“We tend to it.”

Hyunjin rolls onto his side and stares at Woojin with curious eyes. “Tend to it?”

“Take care of it. However you want to say it. We're stewards of the oceans. There aren't many of us left in the world, and most of us live alone or in small groups scattered around different seas to take care of that area.” Woojin sits himself down beside Hyunjin and gestures out with an arm. “Our responsibility is the Tasman Sea between the shores of Australia and New Zealand.”

“What do you do though?” Hyunjin asks with a questioning sparkle in his eyes. “Did Seungmin help you guys out? Why here?”

“We take care of the sea life, from the plants to the animals. We clean the waters when necessary and remove nets, hooks, garbage and oil. We also grow and harvest precious stones as a form of currency between the different siren clans. Our Seungmin had a knack for that job, but he always preferred to work with the sea creatures.”

Hyunjin coos, imagining the sight. He smiles to himself, recalling how the brunette had seemed so taken by the harp seal plush toy that he had purchased from the aquarium. He wished he could see Seungmin with a live one, certain that it would be as adorable as it sounded.

“Oh jeez, someone's going to melt the polar ice caps with that sappy look on their face.”

Hyunjin snaps back to the real world and immediately zooms in on a hand waving in front of his face. He traces it back to Jisung who looks amusedly disgusted and he bats the siren's hand away. “Shut up, I've consciously known you for a good five hours and the only sappy look going around is the one on your face when you look at Minho,” Hyunjin retorts.

Woojin grins at the remark. “He's got you there, Jisung.”

 

“I heard my name!”

 

And a vaguely leopard-printed bullet zooms through, once again bowling Jisung over and sending them both sprawling around in the relatively clear water. Jisung is the first to recover, looping around and glaring at Minho.

“Yah, what did I tell you about looking where you're going?!”

“What did I tell you about getting out of my way?!” Minho retorts, his eyes widening indignantly.

And Hyunjin just bursts into wheezy laughter at the two, tumbling over in his mirth, his eyes curving and crinkling at the corners. The pair turn to face him, both wearing unamused expressions.

“Oh, so you think it's funny, huh?” Jisung challenges, shamelessly getting a little too close for comfort, and Hyunjin just lifts his hand and pushes Jisung's face away from himself with a look of mock disgust.

“Ew, get away from me,” he huffs. “Its hilarious, you guys bicker like an old married couple.”

“Well, it's just our way of showing our undying hatred for each other,” Minho interjects breezily, earning himself a pout from the blue-haired siren.

“But I thought—”

“Idiot, you should know by now that I don't mean it.”

“Idiot yourself, dumbass, I was just joking to see how soft you've gotten."

“Seasnake.”

Hyunjin snorts and bursts into laughter again, much to the chagrin of the pair. Woojin purses his lips and offers Hyunjin a longsuffering pat on the back. “Don't overexert yourself,” he scolds. “You need to get well as soon as possible.”

At that, Hyunjin settles down, pouting slightly. “I want to go back to the surface,” he sighs.

“By all means, be our guest,” Minho calls, cocking an eyebrow at him. “You won't even make it to the surface.” Despite the threatening words, his voice sounds anything but, almost lightheartedly mocking.

“Try me,” Hyunjin huffs, pushing himself off of the coral and freestyling towards the surface. Unfortunately for him, Minho was right, and he expended himself at an embarrassingly quick rate, sinking down tiredly after less than a minute of directing himself upwards. He meets Minho's knowing, green eyes and pouts, his ears reddening. “Don't say anything.”

“Told you.”

“What part of don't say anything do you not understand?”

Minho circles him and pokes him in the middle of his forehead with a long fingernail. “The part where you have the right to restrict my freedom to wisecrack your smartass,” he replies candidly.

Hyunjin crosses his arms over his chest and gradually lies back on the coral. “No wonder Seungmin has to be so cynical, because he deals with this.”

The leopard-tailed siren gasps and grins toothily at Hyunjin. “You underestimate our Seungminnie, he's a little demon.”

Hyunjin's eyes widen comically. “He is the sweetest person on the entire planet and nothing you say can convince me otherwise.”

“... _whipped_.”

Hyunjin turns to glare at Jisung. “You don't have any right to tell me that, go make goo goo eyes at Minho or something.”

“Right, the sea is big enough for both of you, let's not argue,” Woojin scolds before the pair can spiral into yet another argument. He turns to face Jisung. “You weren't harvesting, you were spying on Seungmin, weren't you?”

The blue-haired siren's eyes widen and he shakes his head indignantly. “I wasn't! I was doing my job properly as a good steward of this sea unlike this overprotective manatee—” Jisung bumps against Minho, displacing him from where he floated at ease in front of Hyunjin.

“Overprotective manatee yourself!” Minho retorts. “I actually trust our Seungminnie enough to leave him alone for a bit which is more than I can say for your clingy ass.” He crosses his arms over his chest and cocks an eyebrow at Jisung. The poor boy always has you breathing down his gills because he's the only one here younger than you.”

“There's this guy now,” Jisung pouts, jerking a thumb at Hyunjin.

“I have a name!” Hyunjin yelps.

“Yes, anyway—” Jisung glances over at Minho. “I have rights to be worried because the last time I saw them, I'm pretty sure someone got kicked out of the house and something was on fire. Oh, and someone was cackling like a witch.”

“Lix got kicked out because he tried to use the kitchen unsupervised again and it was probably Innie's idea so he was probably the one laughing,” Hyunjin deduces.

“What's a kitchen?” Minho asks, blinking owlishly. “Is it like a kitten?”

“No, dumbass, it's like...a place where the humans make food,” Jisung corrects.

“Isn't that a garden?”

“I believe a garden is where they grow plants,” Woojin inputs.

Hyunjin just finds it rather amusing how they confused the simplest things, but then again, he couldn't understand their lives either. It fascinated him how some things that he thought was perfectly normal wasn't for them and vice-versa. He sits back, leaning his weight against the heels of his hands as he watches them exchange their opinions on human-related concepts, all drifting further and further away from the original subject of the kitchen.

“Like those sea urchins with legs. You know what I'm talking about, right, Minho?”

“Hedgehogs?”

“Yeah! Those things!”

“Everyone knows what a hedgehog is dumbass, how did you forget?”

Hyunjin just snorts and sits up. “So how long can you two go without bickering?” he asks, cocking his head innocently, strands of his hair wafting out in the water before falling to a graceful rest by his ear.

“I believe it was twelve hours,” Woojin informs before either of the pair can respond. “And that was mostly because one of them would be asleep.”

“Wow, you don't hear me going around trash-talking you to your face,” Minho remarks, sounding rather peeved. “I have the decency to do it behind your back at least.”

“Uh...you know that isn't better, ri—” Hyunjin blinks as a slender finger presses against his lips, silencing him. He glances up to meet the siren's emerald eyes, gleaming with mischief and he just pouts and bites Minho's finger lightly. The man just stares down at him, his eyes widening in distaste and he grins, releasing the siren's appendage. “Tastes fishy.”

Minho just swims up, whacking him over with his tail in the process, sending him sprawling off of the coral and flailing around in the water, giggling helplessly. The leopard-tailed man just looks very displeased, but Jisung can't quite disguise his grin and eventually ends up swimming loops in the water, laughing hysterically. “Pft— should've seen your face!” He gasps, poking a finger at Minho. “It's like that time that Min stuck those leeches on your tail when he was like five..”

Hyunjin's eyes sparkle and he turns to look at Jisung as he drags himself back onto the coral. “Seungminnie did?”

“Hell yeah, he did,” Jisung crows, looking all too pleased. He plops himself down purposefully beside Hyunjin. “So hear me out. Five year old Seungmin swimming around, and he finds some saltwater leeches. Thinks it's the coolest thing ever, pries some off the rocks and goes and sticks them on Minho while he's asleep.”

Hyunjin giggles at the thought of a little Seungmin playing pranks on the sirens although it did mess with his perception as he's reminded that the sirens are much older than he was. He just shakes his head, imagining a young Seungmin grinning his crinkle-eyed, open-mouthed grin as he sticks leeches on Minho's tail. He coos. “I'll ask him about it when I see him.” He pouts. “I want to see him. Can I see him?”

Woojin peers down at him. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I just died,” Hyunjin quips dryly without missing a beat. “But I can move around and for the most part I feel all right. I just want to make sure he's all right, can I see him, please?”

“Look at him, Woojinnie, the poor boy is whipped, let's just let him go.”

Woojin shakes his head. “Certainly not. It's been less than a day since he's recovered his senses, I say we leave it for a night, let his body get used to his higher thought again and vice-versa.” He turns to face Hyunjin. “You can see him tomorrow.”

Hyunjin nods, not bothering to hide his disappointment, but he knows that Woojin is probably just ensuring his safety. Or at least his experience with mum friends told him so, and Woojin was most definitely a mum friend and no one could convince him otherwise.

 

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

When the stars hang low in the sky and the water reflects silver scales from the unclouded moonlight, Hyunjin breaks the surface of the water for the first time since regaining his consciousness. He gasps at the coldness of the air, but quickly regains himself, slicking his hair back with his fingers and staring up at the sky. Drawing in a deep breath, he takes in the scent of the sea.

It felt strange to have two different kinds of airways now, but it seemed as though his body automatically understood how to shut down one and make use of the other whenever necessary. He touches the folds of skin on his neck and shivers slightly at the strangeness of the feeling. It felt both natural and unnatural at the same time, and he has to wonder how Seungmin had felt when he had received his new lease on life.

Hyunjin's eyes shift to the white-sand shoreline a fair distance away and then past that to the bungalow, lights shut off and all. He sighs and swims just a little closer but stops, holding himself back from just running in and probably giving Felix cardiac arrest from thinking he's seen a ghost. Hyunjin smiles slightly at the thought.

He just wanted to know if they were doing all right, if Chan was still trying to tighten the reins on the youngers’ wildness, if Changbin was still being teased for being him, if Felix was still that one obnoxious friend who followed every internet trend there was to follow, if Jeongin was still plotting against all of them in secret; he wanted to know if Seungmin was all right. The brunette wasn't used to living as a human. Of course maybe he knew his way around it more or less by now, but Hyunjin was sure he didn't feel comfortable in a human skin.

Hyunjin hoped that Seungmin felt comfortable enough to at least cuddle someone, knowing how easily the brunette grew cold. He was probably freezing right now. Hyunjin swims just a few metres closer to the shore, his eyes zooming in on the building, but he stops short and just keeps himself above the water with a frown.

“Worried?”

Hyunjin tenses and nearly flops over into the water with a yelp, but Woojin catches him by the arm and holds him until he regains his rhythm again. He pouts. “I wasn't going to go anywhere, I swear.”

“Calm down, I'm not going to bite your head off,” Woojin assures with a grin.

“I mean with those chompers, it's anyone's game,” Hyunjin responds, poking at the siren's lips. He grins slightly before turning back to the shore and sighing. “But yeah, I’m a bit worried.”

“It’s all right.” Hyunjin tenses slightly when he feels Woojin’s hand settling on his shoulder, but he reminds himself that he can’t drown now. He closes his eyes, his brow furrowing.

“Woojin, I...don’t know. I should probably trust them more, but… Chan hyung’s probably blaming himself for everything and Binnie hyung is probably trying to hold them all together right now and Lix is probably really sad and Innie—”

“Hyunjin.” Hyunjin’s mouth snaps shut at the admonishing tone in the siren’s voice. He glances back at Woojin to find a pair of golden eyes meeting his own sympathetically. “You’ll be seeing them tomorrow. I’m sure they’ll be fine for the night.”

“But what about Seungmin?” Hyunjin frowns. “Woojin, Seungminnie gets so cold outside of the sea, I’m worried that he won’t have enough to keep himself warm…”

At that, the siren only chuckles and tugs him back gently. “If there’s one thing that I can tell you for certain, it’s that no one has a stronger survival instinct than our Seungmin. He’ll be fine, Hyunjin. But you need to go sleep yourself. I don’t think it’ll make him worry any less if he sees you practically dead on your feet.”

“I mean it wouldn’t be a wrong presumption,” Hyunjin points out, but follows him back anyway, casting a last glance at the shoreline.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just one more chapter, it's been a real ride~  
> Thank you for taking time out of your day to read, and I'll see you next chapter ^^


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> O.o we're finally here  
> It's been a real journey and I'd just like to thank all you readers for being here for it, I'll never stop appreciating you <3  
> I'm sad that it's ending, but I'm grateful for the journey and I hope you enjoy~

“ _Felix, I told you to heat the waffles not yeet the waffles! How did you even hear that?!_ ”

“ _I know how to cook!_ ”

“ _Then kindly tell me why there are boxed waffles on the ceiling—_ ”

“ _Just a bit of butter and vegemite!_ ”

“ _Felix!_ ”

 

Seungmin is dragged out of the bedroom by the uproarious exchange in the kitchen and he frowns, running one hand through his bird’s-nest bedhead to tame it while rubbing his eyes with the other. He takes one glance at the scene in the kitchen and sighs. “Just clean the toaster and make something else,” he calls, his voice muffled with sleep.

His troubles earn him two glances before Felix yelps and hurries over to him, herding him out of the kitchen while simultaneously ripping off his shirt and throwing it at Seungmin. “Hey, Min, mind putting some clothes on?” The blonde barks.

Seungmin stares at him in confusion before looking down and belatedly realizing that he was naked. He blinks slowly before throwing Felix's shirt back at him. “You keep your greasy shirt, I can feel the butter,” he retorts before spinning on his heel to go grab himself some clothes.

He doesn't miss the wolf whistle behind him that sounds suspiciously like Jeongin, but Jeongin is the world's most innocent little angel who could do no wrong, so of course it isn't him.

Seungmin throws on an oversized shirt and a pair of shorts and wastes no time in returning to the kitchen lest anything else burns. It had only been his fifth day alone with them and they had somehow managed to set something on fire three times when left unsupervised. Seungmin was beginning to see why Chan didn’t want to allow them into the kitchen.

He glances up at the somehow melted waffle stuck to the ceiling and sighs. Felix was currently holding a toaster and attempting to clean it and Seungmin’s eyes widen. “What the hell, Felix, you unplug it first!” he gasps, moving to pull the plug on the appliance before the blonde experienced the shock of his life...literally.

Chan glances back from the sink and groans. “I love you, but I really think it's better for my mental and emotional wellbeing when you _aren’t_ in the kitchen, Felicia.”

Felix pouts and upends the crumbs caught within the toaster. “Just get a new toaster.”

Oh yes. Seungmin had also learned the value of money when he learned how absolutely filthy rich Felix was. He turns around and smacks the blonde upside his head with a rubber spatula. “This one will work just fine if you clean it out properly and not electrocute yourself in the process,” he deadpans. “Go donate to clean up all the trash you humans throw into the ocean with all that money of yours instead of getting a new toaster.”

“That’s actually a pretty good idea!” Felix suddenly exclaims, his eyes sparkling as though the wheel had been reinvented before his eyes. Seungmin pinches the bridge of his nose and then clambers onto the counter, reaching up with the spatula to scrape the waffle off the ceiling. He wrinkles his nose as it falls and reaches up to catch it before it splats onto his face.

He’s quick to jump off the counter and deposit the godforsaken definitely _not-_ food-item into the trash before it could grow legs and crawl away or start cussing him out. He goes to the sink and runs his hand under water just in case. And the spatula too because who knew what Felix put in his hair.

“Forget the waffles,” he tells Chan. “I’ll just make eggs.”

“You really are a lifesaver, huh?” Chan remarks dryly, grabbing a pan off a hook on the wall and handing it to him.

Seungmin only shrugs and glances back at Felix. “I just don’t want to eat whatever he ends up making.”

“You are officially unfriended,” Felix calls back loudly, still pouting slightly and Seungmin snorts.

“How bold of you to assume we were friends to begin with, Yongbok,” he calls back without missing a beat.

He turns his back to the sputtering Felix and sets the pan on the stove with a smile to himself. He pulls out the carton of eggs and cracks them into the pan with a kind of practiced ease even though he had really only done this once beforehand and that was two days ago because Jeongin had somehow managed to burn salad. Seungmin could forgive that because it had only cost them a cheap saucepan and Jeongin was cute. Besides, he had discovered eggs, the world’s greatest food through them. And he could make a mean egg, if he did say so himself.

“You know what, I’m going to watch tv,” Felix sniffs. “The koala brothers are better friends that you all will ever be.”

“Pity,” Seungmin drawls although by now he really can’t hide the slight grin on his face, but at the very least he can ensure that Felix can’t see it.

“Hey, come watch tv with me, Innie,” he hears Felix call from the living room and he chuckles, rolling his eyes.

Living with Chan, Felix, Changbin and Jeongin was something that Seungmin had become used to faster than he had ever expected, but somehow they had developed a dynamic that vaguely reminded Seungmin of another one that he really didn’t want to think about at the moment. It was like his underwater life, but with different hazards and less water and someone who was actually cute (read: Jeongin).

It didn’t mean he had just forgotten about everything that had happened. He still hadn’t forgiven the sirens. He still couldn’t come to terms with himself. He still wanted to ignore the fact that Hyunjin wasn’t there although it was sometimes terribly hard to try and forget when every night was just so cold and the bed just seemed so much bigger, and Seungmin’s smile just disappears at his own thoughts. He sets some eggs on a few plates with pursed lips and a distant look in his eyes.

Of course Chan, Changbin, Felix and Jeongin were there for him, tried their best for him although they were struggling as well, and Seungmin would never not be grateful for it, but there was still that gap in his chest and the goosebumps on his skin that refused to go away. He felt terrible for making the four of them seem inadequate, but the truth was that they were. They weren’t Hyunjin. They couldn’t warm him the way Hyunjin could. They couldn’t make him smile the way that Hyunjin had. The degree of closeness was different, which made sense since Seungmin had long since understood and accepted the fact that the way he felt towards Hyunjin and the way that he felt towards the four of them were considerably different. They couldn’t fill the empty space that Hyunjin had left.

He shakes his head and refocusses his mind on eggs because he didn’t want to be called out for accidentally burning something after all his energy in wiping the floor with Felix’s cooking skills earlier. His pride wouldn’t let him.

Now Seungmin did have the ability to have an intense focus on whatever he set his mind on, but he was so invested in the eggs on the stove and the bacon that had somehow made it onto another pan on another stove unit that he fails to hear the gasp and retreating footsteps of Felix, the exchange of words in the living room, Chan in particular sounding rather stressed and Jeongin snapping at something (someone?). Tuning an entire commotion out took incredible focus, and Seungmin definitely had that because even when Changbin storms out of the bedroom, he doesn’t notice.

“Hey, Min!” He can’t ignore the sudden and obnoxious voice that resounds perilously close to his ear and he whips around, still holding the oiled spatula, brandishing it at a certain blue-haired man who stares at him with comically wide eyes. His own eyes widen and for a few moments both of them are caught at a standstill until the blue-haired man pushes the spatula away. “I see you’re just as pleasant as ever,” the man remarks smartly.

Seungmin lowers the spatula slowly, his gaze blank, and then turns to quietly shut off the stove. He shifts around once more and wordlessly passes Jisung, grabbing the man’s wrist and tugging him along because logically, he put as much trust in Jisung in a kitchen as he did with Felix in a kitchen. He pushes him down onto one of the couches only to notice that Minho and Woojin are there as well in all their half-naked glory, their sharkskins wrapping tightly around pairs of legs like second skins and he immediately looks up because he really didn’t want to see that right now.

“What are you doing here?” he asks, his voice cold. Whatever Chan must have been discussing immediately freezes when they catch sight of him, and he doesn’t bother to hide the fact that he isn’t at all pleased to see them.

 

“Min, there you are! For a moment we were worried that you went off somewhere—”

 

“Don’t try to be friendly with me,” Seungmin snaps, staring down Minho who seemed rather taken aback by his cold demeanour. “What are you doing here? What do you want with these people?”

“These people? Min, we aren't here for them, we came for you. We haven’t used our legs in decades,” Jisung immediately interjects defensively.

Seungmin’s eyes narrow. “Well you have me now, so spit it out or I’ll throw all of you into the sea myself,” he hisses.

Woojin, who had sat silently throughout the exchange finally looks up, pinning Seungmin to his place with a golden-eyed stare. Seungmin tenses, faltering back a step, but then catching himself and standing firmly. He stares back at the siren, his jaw tightening slightly.

“Seungmin,” the man begins, his voice placating, “I hope you’re trying to understand that we wouldn’t have wanted things to end like this either…”

Seungmin just stares at him with resent before looking away. “Yeah...I know,” he mutters softly after a few moments. “It happened because of me.” He seems to shrink, whatever anger he had fading away just as rapidly as it had come.

“Hey, Min…” Jisung lifts himself to his feet and steps over to Seungmin, resting a hand on his shoulder. “I’m going to ask you something. how do you feel about humans now?”

Seungmin lifts his head and glares at the blue-haired man, throwing Jisung’s hand off of his shoulder. “If you’re just going to rub it in my face now, it’s not appreciated, Sung.”

Jisung shakes his head. “No, I’m serious, Min.”

Seungmin looks away from him only to meet Minho’s eyes, and the man’s face is unusually grave. He sighs and looks over at Chan, who looks oddly concerned, his lips parted as though he wanted to speak, but was holding himself back. His gaze travels to Jeongin who wears tiredness on his face and carries bags under his vulpine eyes, and Seungmin realizes that they must all have been hiding the same thing that he was. He should have realized that they wouldn’t be so callous as to put Hyunjin behind after a few mere days.

His eyes shift to Felix, who is pointedly standing behind Changbin, his fingers curled around the shorter man’s bicep and a wary, almost frightened look in his dark eyes. Seungmin realizes that he must still be terrified after the incident with Minho and Jisung and  a wave of worry washes over him. Changbin on the other hand doesn’t look too pleased to see the sirens at all, and taking all things into consideration, Seungmin could comprehend why.

Seungmin turns to look back at Jisung. “I’ve already told you,” he states, his voice slightly hoarse as though he hadn’t drunk water in a while. “I don’t hate them. They’ve been nothing but kind to me.” He takes a step back and stretches his arms out again, making himself look suddenly much taller than Jisung and obstructing the path between the sirens and the humans. His gaze darkens. “And I’ll say it again, if you want to hurt them, you’ll have to hurt me too.”

Minho suddenly begins to chuckle and Seungmin’s arms drop to his sides as his gaze shifts over to the green-eyed man, whose hand covered his eyes as his shoulders shake with the force of his own laughter, and Seungmin can’t help but feel mocked. He frowns. Minho lowers his hand and meets Seungmin’s eyes with his own smiling ones. “I’m not laughing at you, Seungminnie,” he quickly reassures. “It’s just...this explains a lot.”

“Explains a lot?” Chan is the first to speak after the unbearably thick silence, his words guarded and almost heavy in the already hopelessly thick atmosphere.

Seungmin suddenly feels his throat dry up as the words sink in, their sudden appearances sink in, and when he sees Woojin’s lips part to speak, he doesn’t dare hope.

“Seungmin!” Before the siren has a chance to speak, the door suddenly bursts open and Seungmin finds himself on the floor with a whole pile of drenched, lanky and _warm_ enveloping him. His body realizes what it is before his mind even has the chance to. His chest clenches and tears flood his eyes, spilling down his suddenly blanched cheeks as his arms encircle a familiar neck. He traces the soft scar tissue that laced it with his fingertips, the pads of his fingers running over familiar yet unfamiliar folds of skin. His eyes widen.

“H-Hyun…” he croaks slowly. His voice comes out strangled. He draws in a breath, his eyes tightly shut, not daring to open unless this was some kind of cruel dream. “Hyunjin…?”

He can feel the heartbeat, feel the familiar warmth and he can’t possibly mistake it for anything else and his mind is filled to the brim with questions but at the same time is eerily blank with how overwhelmed he felt because—his arms tighten around the figure on top of him—this has to be a dream. This has to be.

When he hears Jeongin and Felix collectively gasp and scream loudly and immediately feels more weight on top of himself from where the two had presumably jumped on top of them, he finally opens his eyes and his breaths just turn into gasps, his vision blurring when he sees dark eyes, a mole beneath the left one, plush lips curled into a warm smile, sun-kissed skin; he knows that face. He loves that face.

Seungmin sits up slowly, his arms shaking, and Hyunjin is still pressed close to him and he feels more arms wrap around all of them as Chan and Changbin join their messy group hug and they’re all crying again, but this time none of them are sad. Seungmin can’t seem to wipe the grin off of his face as he keeps his arms latched around Hyunjin’s neck. All his questions lose their importance because Hyunjin is here. Hyunjin is alive. His hand rests atop the man’s chest and yes, he could feel that strong, _familiar_ heartbeat. It sung to him more sweetly than any siren song.

He feels so full that he’s overflowing and it’s an odd sense of being overwhelmed and being empty and wanting more at the same time. It’s a heady feeling, and for a few moments Seungmin does blank out, unable to do much more than stare at Hyunjin like he hung the stars in the sky, tears glossing his eyes and blurring his vision.

“Hyunjin..” he whispers. “Hyunjin— it’s really you, right? Hyunjin? It’s you, right?” He murmurs almost nonsensically as he reaches up to touch Hyunjin’s face, fingertips tracing the soft skin from his temple down to his lips. Seungmin wanted to kiss him. So he does, leaning forward and stealing Hyunjin’s lips and they’re as soft as he remembers. They taste like salt and the sea, but he couldn’t care less. He doesn’t hold it for long because he begins to sob softly and he feels Hyunjin’s hand pulling his head up against his chest. When he realizes that he can hear Hyunjin’s heartbeat, he somehow only ends up crying harder.

“Seungminnie, I missed you..”

Seungmin meets Hyunjin’s eyes as the man takes his head in his hands, coaxing him to look up. Seungmin isn’t sure, but he swears Hyunjin is crying too and Seungmin just throws his arms around him again, burying his face in Hyunjin’s shoulder and just revelling in the warmth that he had missed all this time. Hyunjin was warmer than all the others combined and Seungmin wasn’t sure if it was natural or just something that he had just come to acquaint Hyunjin with.

“Hwang Hyunjin I can say that I missed you more,” Seungmin whispers, his voice muffled in Hyunjin's neck. “I'm not letting you go anywhere this time. Never again..” His arms tighten around Hyunjin’s frame and he just feels so _warm,_ he can’t help but smile although it’s hidden by Hyunjin’s soaking wet shoulder. The hand that’s buried in his hair and the one that’s settled on his hip from where Hyunjin’s arms envelop him make him feel safer almost. The sudden feeling of Hyunjin’s lips against his scalp makes Seungmin laugh softly, the sound once again muffled by Hyunjin’s shirt, but he couldn’t care less. He could stay in Hyunjin’s arms like that forever, regardless of what was happening or who was there to witness it.

Hyunjin was here. Hyunjin was here, in his arms. Hyunjin’s heart was beating against his chest, Hyunjin’s breaths were tickling the hairs on the back of his neck, Hyunjins hands were pulling him closer, Hyunjin was here. Hyunjin was _alive._ Seungmin’s grip tightens slightly. Never had he felt such an imperative gravitation to anyone as he did now, and never did he want to any more because this was all that he wanted. The person who pulled him out of the water and treated him like a friend, who loved him unreservedly and wanted him, here and in his arms.

He’s forced to move away eventually when curiosity drives him to, and he looks up at Hyunjin, his arms still loosely wrapped around him as though to make sure that nothing would happen to him. “How are you here?” he asks him slowly. “I...I saw you die.”

Hyunjin winces and rubs at his neck with a pout. “Yeah… Wow, you don’t know how grateful I was to not be conscious for the second part of that. Woojinnie showed me and it looked pretty rough.” Seungmin purses his lips and proceeds to smack Hyunjin upside the head, but not hard, earning himself a whine from the man. “Yah, I didn’t even do anything!”

“I _saw_ you _die_ , Hyunjin, I was _there._ And now you aren’t dead, and as happy as I am about that, I still want an explanation. So please stop beating around the bush.” Seungmin raises an eyebrow expectantly and Hyunjin’s pout deepens.

“You hit me,” he huffs. “I won’t speak a word.”

Seungmin groans and facepalms and he swears he can hear laughter from Jeongin, but Jeongin was the cutest little thing in the world so that was all right. He meets Hyunjin’s eyes. “Hwang Hyunjin, I won’t let you have any cuddles for the next week if you keep acting like an overgrown baby.”

And Hyunjin’s eyes go stupidly wide at the threat. He wilts. “I thought you missed me,” he whines but doesn’t waste much more time in cutting to the chase. “I mean...I probably was dead. Jisung said they made sure I was dead. He also called me ugly which is fine since he's clearly uglier than me—”

“We can both agree on that,” Seungmin decides offhandedly, ignoring the offended cry from the couch and Minho's bright laughter.

“—but anyway, that’s not the point, the point is you saved me, Seungminnie, thank you, I love you,” Hyunjin blurts before realizing that he’d just rambled again. He blushes darkly and Seungmin just stares at him stupefied, mouth open, but no words leaving it as he lifts a finger and points at Hyunjin before pointing at himself, and then Hyunjin again. It goes on like that for a few more moments, with Hyunjin too flustered to say anything and Seungmin too stunned.

“Wow, this is really sad,” Jisung suddenly declares obnoxiously before clearing his throat and pointing to Seungmin. “You,” he begins bluntly. “Are so hopelessly in love with Mr. Handsome-but-still-not-as-handsome-as-me over there that you gave him back his life.” And when Seungmin turns to face him, still looking rather dazed and his mouth still hanging open in apparent and puppy-like confusion, Jisung frowns and stands up, striding over to and crouching down beside them. He raises a finger and then prods at Hyunjin’s cheek with his nail. “This dumbass is alive because of the strength of the love in your heart.”

 

“...you could’ve just said so,” Seungmin finally deadpans when he comes to, and Jisung’s eyes widen in indignation.

 

“This is the thanks I get for explaining everything to you guys out of the kindness of my heart? How rude.”

Seungmin pushes the siren over and rolls his eyes. “Would you rather have me gush over it and moon over you? I think not, that’s Minho’s job.”

“You might not realize how much he values your validation,” Minho calls from where he sits on the couch, arms crossed loosely over his chest and a look of amusement written on his face, lips parted into a sharp-toothed grin.

“Me? Value this guy’s opinion? Minho, baby, if I did, I’d probably by crying in a trench right now,” Jisung retorts.

“Wasn’t that what you did the time you gave Seungmin a coral talisman and he called it ugly?” Minho chirps unreservedly.

Jisung’s face reddens and he shakes his head fervently. “Lies.”

Seungmin’s lips twitch slightly before curling into a smile, and his eyes soften. He lifts his head to look at Hyunjin and reaches out, almost shyly, to touch the man’s hand. He faces Jisung. “It was pretty ugly,” he decides.

Jisung’s features contort into the very picture of offence. “Okay, wow.”

Hyunjin laughs, his fingers curling around Seungmin’s hand shyly when he finally gathers himself, and he scans the expanse, looking over all of them, Chan, Changbin, Felix and Jeongin with sparkling eyes before finally landing on Seungmin. “You know, this kind of feels fake.”

“I’m the one that’s seeing you right now after witnessing you murdered,” Seungmin points out.

“I’m the one that got murdered,” Hyunjin counters.

“Yes, but you were unconscious when it happened,” Seungmin responds.

“Can we not talk about Hyunjin hyung getting murdered? As annoying as he is, I think that I might have a tiny feeling that maybe I kind of sort of just perhaps want to have him alive for a bit longer…?”

Hyunjin glances up at Jeongin and squeals, hopping to his feet and releasing Seungmin’s hand in favour of darting over to the maknae and enveloping him in a tight hug. “Innie! I knew you’d accept my love eventually,” he declares dramatically, only to have the youngest struggling in his grip and eventually pushing him away and into Felix who stumbles and trips over his feet, careening down to the floor. Felix’s eyes widen as he hits the wood with a thump and he grabs Hyunjin by the shirt.

“Yah, Hwang Hyunjin!” the blonde growls, grappling with him and eventually pushing him down onto his back, a fistful of the man’s tattered shirt in his hand. “You put a nick in my Rolex!”

“Are they always like this?” Woojin whispers after having quietly stepped over to Chan who seemed caught between being elated and being terribly stressed. The curly-haired man turns to stare at him before glancing back at the pair of pretty boys on the floor.

“Not normally. They’re being pretty gentle with each other,” he mutters in response. Woojin’s lips part into a silent ‘o’.

“Just buy another one, Felicia!” Hyunjin howls, writhing out of his grip and tussling with him again until he has the blonde pinned beneath his thighs. “You’re rich, don’t complain to me about nicks!” Felix just glares up at him for a few moments before his lips part into a splitting grin and he begins to laugh brightly.

“You’re really back—”

“Brilliant deduction, my dear Yongbokie,” Hyunjin deadpans before grinning, his eyes glistening slightly with familiar and easily provoked tears that don’t shed this time.

Felix reaches up and flicks Hyunjin’s forehead before pushing him off of himself and sitting up. “Next time no dying, okay?”

Hyunjin laughs, the sound dorky and just plain _Hyunjin_ and he nods. “Yeah, I got you.”

 

“So is no one gonna bring up the fact that he has those gills on his neck like Seungmin does?” Changbin finally states, drawing attention to Hyunjin’s neck.

 

He blushes and covers his gills with a pout. “Can’t a man have some privacy?” he huffs.

Jeongin just inches closer to him and pokes and prods at his neck, making him spasm and flinch away from the younger, who just slumps over him and pokes at his neck again, tugging at the flaps of skin and making him whine. “Hey, that tickles!”

Jeongin glances up. “Yep, they’re real.”

“Wait— that means that Hyunjin isn’t human any more?” Chan suddenly exclaims, his eyes widening.

“Now, no one said that,” Woojin quickly interjects, crossing his arms over his chest. “We couldn’t risk moving him out of the water in his condition, so we did the next thing we could do: give him a method to breathe when he did revive. He’s still very human, incapable of magic, with a short lifespan and weak.” Woojin’s golden eyes glint slightly with a hint of laughter as Hyunjin’s face scrunches into one of disgruntlement. “He just happens to have the added bonus of being able to breathe underwater.”

Felix’s eyes bug and he prods at Hyunjin’s neck, causing the man to shriek and giggle. “Wow, that’s sick!”

“Who even says that any more?” Chan asks dryly.

“I don’t appreciate having my lexicon judged by Mr. Imma-protect-all-my-ninjas, Chris,” Felix retorts.

"Low blow, Felicia."

“Do they hurt?” Changbin wonders, looking rather concerned, and Hyunjin shakes his head to alleviate the worry.

“They did at first, but they’re fine now,” he replies.

Seungmin frowns. “You’re going to keep living as a human, right? Won’t that cause problems?” he queries. “You’ll need to wear those strange sweaters with the high necks—”

“Turtlenecks?” Jeongin inputs.

“Those,” Seungmin confirms. He shakes his head. “It’ll become an inconvenience for you, Hyunjin.”

Hyunjin purses his lips. “Well luckily I look good in turtlenecks,” he quips before tilting his head. “Makeup can help cover it…” He shrugs. “I’ll worry about it when it gets there. Right now I’m just happy to be back...and alive.”

“Aw, look at him, Sungie, all grown up and mature,” Minho coos. “How attractive.”

Jisung turns to stare at him with wide, steel-blue eyes. “More than me?”

“Oh, definitely.”

Seungmin just laughs as it all plays out, his gaze brimming with warmth at the sight of them, all of them, coexisting and more or less at peace with each other. His eyes fall on Hyunjin again who is surrounded by Jeongin and Felix and he flashes him a happy smile. In turn he receives one that makes Hyunjin’s eyes disappear and his dimples indent his cheeks.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

“So…” Chan begins, settling himself down beside Hyunjin on the warm, white sand, following the man’s fond gaze to where Seungmin is playing about in the water with Felix, Jeongin and Jisung. Chan pauses momentarily to appreciate the sight of the siren being absolutely bullied by the three youngest although he has a feeling that Jisung appreciates the attention and is having fun despite his vociferous outbursts of indignation. He glances over at Hyunjin again. “Why weren’t you with them when they first came to the door this morning?”

“Oh, that?” Hyunjin pouts. “I got my ankle tangled in kelp while swimming back and they ditched me.”

Chan laughs and cocks an eyebrow. “Really? That doesn’t seem like a very Woojin thing to do. Minho and Jisung maybe, but…” he glances back at the sun-kissed water and watches as Minho jumps out, dragging Jisung down in his descent and into the water while Woojin just watches over them from his perch on a nearby rock.

“You talk about him like you know him well,” Hyunjin remarks. “He’s actually secretly evil, but don’t tell him I said that.” Just as he finishes speaking, the golden-eyed siren’s head turns to face them and Hyunjin’s eyes widen. “How the hell do you even hear me from that far away?!” he yelps.

Chan chuckles and leans back against his palms. “If there’s one thing I know for sure, it’s that those guys have some crazy good hearing.”

“Well, you’re not wrong,” Hyunjin remarks dryly.

Changbin drops himself down beside them and rests his head on Hyunjins lap, watching the ones in the water. “I think that Chan hyung’s actually been an acquaintance of that siren’s for a while now,” he informs frankly, causing both Hyunjin and Chan to look down at him in surprise.

“How do you know?” Hyunjin asks dubiously.

“I second that question.”

Changbin shrugs. “Seungmin told me,” he informs nonchalantly.

Chan's eyes widen. “...how did he know?”

“Remember the night where I banned you from your laptop?”

“Wow, hyung, you must've had a death wish.”

“Shut up, overgrown beanpole—”

“Hey, don't go discriminating against tall people just because you're short!”

“ _Anyway_ , Seungmin told me that he'd felt strange that night and he was going to go for a swim because he thought that he must have been dehydrated, but when he was about to go out, he saw you with Woojin. He didn't give me more details than that, but he told me that he thought he should let me know because he was worried about what it would mean for you, but I'd probably have a better chance of keeping you safe than he did if worst came to worst.” Changbin chuckles. “He was really worried about you, hyung.”

“I see..” Chan glances out to see Seungmin laughing aloud as he's splashed by Felix, ducking under the water only to pop up right next to the blonde, evoking a shriek from him. The curly-haired man chuckles. “He really missed you, you know,” he suddenly mentions, glancing back at Hyunjin.”

“He must have if he's the reason Hyunjin is alive,” Changbin point out.

Hyunjin smiles and rests his hand on Changbin’s shoulder absently, his gaze fixed on the brunette, who still happily plays around with the others. “I’m honestly just happy that he doesn’t have to feel hatred any more,” he replies. “When the sirens took me, I was able to feel what he felt for humanity that had wronged him. It was dreadful, hyungs, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you. All that in someone like him, I’m surprised he didn’t take my head off when we first met. I’m glad he’s been able to reconcile.”

“That’s because of you,” Changbin states, sitting up. “You changed him. I think that’s the general consensus around here.”

Hyunjin shakes his head. “I didn’t change him,” he disagrees. “This Seungminnie was always there, but no one reached out to him, so he never knew what it was like. I just happened to find him and...well...develop a really progressive crush on him…?” Hyunjin flushes.

Chan laughs. “Right, that’s how this all started, when you found him naked on the beach,” he recalls.

“It seems like so long ago now,” Changbin adds, chuckling amusedly.

 

“Binnie, hey, Binnie!” the trio glance up as Felix comes hurtling out of the water with a mischievous grin on his face. Drenched and all, he latches himself to the shorter man. “Come play with us!”

“I think I’ll stay here, Lixie—” Changbin begins only for Felix to grab his ankles.

“Chris, you get his arms!” Felix declares, and the man immediately hops up, grabbing Changbin’s wrists. The pair collectively drag him into the water and toss him in despite his screams of protest, and Hyunjin just bursts into laughter as Jisung loops around the shorter man and splashes him with his tail, a toothy grin on his face.

 

“You think you’re off scot-free, hyung?” Jeongin suddenly chirps beside his ear, causing him to yelp and jump away.

“No, no, nope.” He shakes his head. “I’ve had enough water for a while—”

 

“You can never have enough water, _love_.”

 

Hyunjin screeches as Seungmin’s hand curls around his shoulder and he begins to struggle as the brunette and the youngest grab him and run into the water, throwing him in. He closes his eyes as he goes under and momentarily holds his breath, forgetting that he can still breathe. He opens his eyes and exhales simultaneously only to find Seungmin under the waves with him, a fond glint in his silvery eyes.

He’s beautiful, with the refracted sunlight dancing over his skin in translucent waves, his hair drifting about in the water like a halo, his movements as graceful as though he were finally in his natural habitat. Hyunjin can’t help but stare. Seungmin catches his gaze and smiles warmly.

Hyunjin giggles and grins, and Seungmin’s gaze softens. Hyunjin swims forward and just wraps the brunette in a hug again. “Hi, Minnie, I love you,” he hums. Seungmin’s eyes widen slightly, but after a moment he relaxes. His arms shift and loop themselves around Hyunjin’s neck.

“Hello, Hyunjin, I love you too,” Seungmin responds softly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who reads the end notes, this is the official end of the story itself, but if you would like an epilogue, please let me know and I'd be willing to write it~  
> Thank you for all your support, and until next time :)


	15. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Popular opinion wanted an epilogue, so here's an epilogue ^^  
> It's just all in good fun, but I hope you enjoy~

“Alpaca to Koala, this is Alpaca to Koala, do you read me?”

“Loud and clear.”

“The Kangaroo has left the pouch, I repeat, the Kangaroo has left the pouch.”

 

“Hey, what are you two doing?”

 

Hyunjin and Felix screech, Hyunjin tumbling onto the pavement from where he was hidden behind a bush, nearly dropping his phone, while Felix just manages to catch himself before he falls out of the nearby tree. The pair whip around to glare at Jeongin, Hyunjin shushing him and motioning for him to crouch down and hide. Hyunjin covers Jeongin’s mouth as Chan walks past them trussed up in stonewashed jeans and a black hoodie, seemingly oblivious to their presence. Jeongin raises an eyebrow and pushes Hyunjin’s hand away.

“What are you two doing? "And why are you wearing trench coats and shades?” the youngest asks again, his voice wry as he glances up at the blonde who hung in the tree toting a pair of binoculars at his nose. Hyunjin shushes him again.

“We’re carrying out a mission of great importance,” he whispers.

“You’re stalking Chan hyung,” Jeongin clarifies.

“No, we aren't,” Hyunjin denies fervently. “He's just been acting weird lately and as his bestest friends, we're going to get to the bottom of why,” he declares.

“So stalking him _and_ sticking your nose in his business.”

“No!”

Jeongin grins slightly. “This is what happens when you suffer from boyfriend withdrawal, hyung? It's been months and this is what you get up to? Don't you have a choreo project to work on?"

Hyunjin's eyes widen and the blood rushes to his ears. “No..” he pouts and Jeongin's grin widens.

“Suuuure.”

“Koala to Alpaca!” Hyunjin glances back at his phone and holds it secretively to his ear as though two young men dressed in dark trench coats and shades hiding in the nearby foliage wasn't the most conspicuous thing in the entire area. “The Kangaroo has turned the corner!”

“Hyungs, you're all idiots,” Jeongin whines and Hyunjin raises a finger aggressively to his lips.

“Shhh! He'll hear us!” Hyunjin glances up at Felix and exchanges a nod. The blonde swings down from his perch in the tree and lands on the ground smoothly before hurrying after Chan. After a moment of hesitation, Jeongin reluctantly runs after them.

Hyunjin's shades slip down the bridge of his nose as he follows the curly-haired blonde (Chan had decided to bleach his hair which meant, as Hyunjin often liked to remind Felix, that he had a new favourite blonde) to the doors of a quaint little flower shop on the street corner with his eyes. His features narrow slightly. “The Kangaroo has entered the garden,” he whispers.

“...hyungs, leave him alone,” Jeongin groans, only to purse his lips as the pair hurry after Chan, making a pitiful attempt at being discreet.

Both Hyunjin and Felix hide behind shelves, peering through to where Chan was eyeing the vibrant blooms around him with a thoughtful look in his eyes. Hyunjin tenses and ducks, pulling Felix down with him when the man's dark eyes pan over the shelves wherein they were hiding for the briefest of moments before a florist approaches him to offer help. Hyunjin breathes out a sigh of relief.

“What's with you two?” Jeongin calls from behind them and both of them whirl around to hush him once again.

“Come on, Innie, you can't say that you haven't been the slightest bit curious as to why Chan hyung's been taking more breaks from his producing than he normally does,” Hyunjin implies with a pout. “And why he seems less tired than usual which is basically a miracle and why he’s so absent-minded lately.”

Jeongin plucks the shades off of his face and spares him a dubiously raised eyebrow. “You do know that's an invasion of privacy?”

“Since when did you ever care about that, Innie?” Felix huffs. “Come on, you must be a little bit curious? The littlest bit? He's been really roundabout when we ask him what he's up to too.”

Hyunjin pulls the pair down again, his eyes shifting to Chan as the man takes a bouquet of anemones from the florist with a smile and a thanks before striding purposefully out of the shop. Hyunjin drags Felix and Jeongin after him before the florist could either approach them and offer to help them or call the cops on them.

“The Kangaroo has vacated the garden,” Felix declares once they've left, his doe eyes following the blonde. Hyunjin nods seriously and Jeongin just facepalms behind them.

“Headed due east,” Hyunjin notices. “Do you think he's going to the do-re-mi room?”

“If you mean the studio, I'm going to kick you, hyung,” Jeongin mutters.

“Do-re-mi room it is,” Felix concurs in complete seriousness.

Hyunjin yelps as Jeongin kicks him in the shin. “Hey! Why just me? Lix said it too,” he whines. Jeongin grabs his wrist and tugs him after Chan.

“You brought it up—!”

Felix follows after them. “Gyu has just informed me that the Kangaroo has arrived at the Do-re-mi room,” he announces, looking down at his phone.

“Gyu? You can't mean—”

“The Kangaroo has left with an acoustic guitar,” Felix continues. “I'll send Gyu our coordinates and he'll be here on the vroom vroom machine. We can't let the tracks grow cold.”

“..why is Changbin hyung endorsing your stalking?!” Jeongin screeches with wide eyes. “And you can just call it a car!”

“Fennec is being too loud,” Felix stage-whispers. “Alpaca, you keep him quiet before he blows our cover.”

“I never agreed to be part of th-mph!” Jeongin finds Hyunjin's hand slapped over his mouth again and he sighs. Resignedly, he removes Hyunjin's hand from his face. “... when's Changbin hyung getting here?”

Hyunjin and Felix exchange grins and wait until the car screeches to a halt by the sidewalk. Jeongin winces. “If I don't make it, tell my parents I love them.” And he doesn't have the time to say much else since Felix pushes him into the backseat alongside Hyunjin while stealing the front passenger's seat and greeting Changbin with a quick peck to the lips.

“Hey, Gyu,” he greets shamelessly, strapping on his seatbelt and pointing forward. “Full speed ahead!”

“Why do I let you rope me into these things?” Changbin sighs, but nonetheless begins to drive. “Chan said he was headed for Han River,” he informs.

“Suspicious,” Felix muses and Hyunjin nods in agreement.

“He normally goes there for inspiration, Lixie, you know that,” Changbin points out.

“Still suspicious,” Hyunjin hums. He stares out of the window. “Chan hyung would never do anything unnecessarily when he has a composition to finish.”

“True…” Changbin agrees after giving it a few moments of thought.

“Don't tell me you're going to stalk Chan hyung too,” Jeongin groans.

“It's not stalking, it's for research purposes,” Hyunjin insists.

“Sure, tell that to the lawyers when Chan hyung files a restraining order against all of you,” Jeongin responds. He blinks owlishly and then gasps. “...that's actually a great idea— why didn't I think of that sooner?” Hyunjin stares at the maknae in mystification and perhaps slight apprehension too as Jeongin begins to mutter under his breath about filing restraining orders against all of them.

The car rolls to a halt by the park nearing the river and the rumbling of the engine silences as Changbin shuts it off, and almost immediately both Felix and Hyunjin hop out of the car, trench coats and all, shuffling across the grass in search of Chan.

It doesn't take long to find him considering the sound of guitar was rather distinct, soft and carried away by the wind that breezed over the river. Hyunjin and Felix exchange nods and quietly sneak behind trees and bushes and park benches, following the sound of the instrument until they catch sight of the man, his back resting at ease against the trunk of a willow, tuning the guitar absently.

“...so if we find out what's going on, will you two stop stalking him?” Jeongin whispers, nearly causing the pair to screech and fall over again. Hyunjin's brow furrows and he gesticulates for the youngest to get down and out of Chan's range of sight. They're joined by Changbin a few moments later who claims that Chan would kill him if they did anything stupid.

There's a soft splash by the riverside, weak enough to go unheeded by the group of four who are more concerned with Chan _suspiciously_ picking up his bouquet of anemones and arranging them carefully, his guitar at his side. The man seemed relaxed, something that was unlike him considering he always seemed to be working tirelessly on something or another and as the sunlight filtered through the dense branches of the willow and struck his pale face in flowing rivulets, he seemed almost content too.

Felix suddenly tenses, nearly shooting upright and knocking them over as a figure approaches Chan, sitting down beside him beneath the shade of the willow. Hyunjin claps a hand over his mouth and grapples him back down before he can say or do anything and just watches intently.

Chan glances up and smiles as the siren settles down beside him on the lush grass, legs folded with a practiced grace. He offers Woojin the anemones with a chuckle. “I really didn't know what you'd like,” he admits, his voice low and soft, so as not to break the delicate atmosphere. “I figured anemones and sea anemones are nothing alike but at least the names are similar.”

The golden-eyed siren, accepts the bouquet and allows his fingertips to brush the silken petals. “You're right that they're nothing alike. These are far more delicate and harmless,” he murmurs, lifting them to breathe in the evanescent fragrance. “They're quite like you, don't you think?”

“I don't think I'm delicate or harmless personally,” Chan responds with a soft laugh.

“Oh, no, you are,” Woojin insists, lowering the bouquet carefully into his lap and turning to face the blonde. “Beautiful, with a delicate heart and a harmless love for those around you.” His golden eyes glimmer with a kind of mirth as Chan's face quite obviously flushes due to the natural paleness of his complexion. “I've seen it for myself.”

“You're taking this awfully seriously, aren't you, Woojin?” Chan remarks dryly, but he's still smiling despite the redness that extended down to his neck, and at that the siren only grins, revealing twin rows of sharp teeth.

“I should hope you weren't the only one to bring a gift,” Woojin hums ignoring the question entirely. Reaching behind his own neck, he unclasps a delicate, silver string from which hung a single, glimmering stone in a blue more vibrant than anything Chan had seen before, perfectly mirroring the turquoise waters of the cove that the sirens called home. Woojin shifts and leans forward to clasp the ornament around his neck and as the stone hits his chest a kind of flowing warmth seeps through his skin. He raises a hand to the stone, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger gently.

“You shouldn't have,” he scolds. “I told you that it wasn't necessary.”

“And I told you the same, but did you listen to me?” Woojin counters with a pleasant smile. “It did take a while to create since it is quite rare, but not impossible.” The siren turns to face the gently flowing river, slicking back wet strands of his dark brown hair. “It is a rule of courting to give tokens that demonstrate the importance of the other to us.”

At that, Chan's skin darkens further as blood rushes to the surface. “I've told you before that you don't need to put so much effort in to court me,” he huffs softly. “I've already agreed to date you. Besides...I'm not rich enough to give gifts like this back to you.” His fingers curl guiltily around the glimmering stone.

“On the contrary,” Woojin disagrees with a shake of his head. “You promised me a greater gift than any that I've given you.” He gestures towards the guitar with a warm smile. “Your gift of music.”

The curly-haired blonde relaxes at that and purses his lips. “Music is free for all. But I do think that you're just flattering me at this point— you're a siren.”

“Music is a gift,” Woojin insists. “It's given from one to another. My music is nothing special to me as it is to you. Yours is far more special to me.” He shrugs. “Flattery is vain and lies will be found out. I'm being honest with you.”

Chan turns to face him and for a few moments they just observe each other in silence. It wasn't a particularly romantic moment at all, not one where they were 'lost in each other's eyes’ or whatever the cliché was, but merely watching each other, almost as though trying to read each other. Finally, the blonde turns away to take his guitar and settle it comfortably in his lap, strumming out a few chords.

The sound carries through the expanse only to fade away with the wind as he plucks delicately at the strings, fingers moving with a grace that proved his passion for his craft. He closes his eyes. “How've the others been?” He asks. “Seungmin? Minho? Jisung? Haven't seen them in a while.”

“I'm sure you heard about the the oil spill that happened last month. They've been so busy with damage controls and maintenance that there's been few opportunities for them to visit. Their minds have been so focussed on their work.”

“And you? How about you?” Chan asks, his eyes opening and shifting to Woojin. “Under that logic, shouldn't you be working too?”

“Of course. But I'll spare time for you too. Most of the oil has been cleared and the humans have helped as well although they're causing an awful lot of noise pollution with their ships and pumps…”

Chan strums out a progression and stares down at the grass. “I don't want to be the reason you feel obligated to be pulled away from your responsibilities,” he admits slowly. “That's not fair to you or them.”

“Oh, hush, will you?” Woojin chuckles and rests a hand on top of Chan's paler one, squeezing it gently before releasing it. “I'm here of my own volition.” He watches the blonde continue to play, still with a somewhat glum look on his face. “How about your friends? Seungmin misses Hyunjin quite a bit. I'm surprised that he didn't decide to accompany you back and stay with him.”

“Oh, Hyunjin definitely misses him,” Chan replies with a chuckle, his good mood returning. “He thrives on physical affection so not having his boyfriend's affection is probably really hard on him. He didn't say why exactly they decided on parting ways for the time being, but I'm sure he had his reasons. Felix and Changbin are doing fine and so is Jeongin. Classes have been busy as always, but that's nothing new.”

“Of course.” Woojin, who had not for a moment turned away while Chan was speaking finally does, tilting his head back and letting the filtered sunlight warm his face and bare torso. “And how are you?”

“I'm fine.” Chan's hand slows to a halt, quieting the music as he turns to face Woojin with a smile. “Midterms are over, so that takes a lot of the stress off. And spending time with you is a bonus.” He chuckles and shakes his head ruefully, plucking out a sweet tune on the strings. “I'm not sure what it is about you, but your presence is soothing.”

“As is yours,” Woojin chuckles and the pair just share a knowing look before Woojin leans forward over the guitar and pecks Chan's lips briefly. He moves back to see the blonde's face dyed pink and he reaches out to brush the man's cheek gently with his knuckles before drawing him in for another gentle kiss, this one lasting longer.

 

“ _A-ha!_ ”

 

The pair jump away from each other, Chan nearly dropping his guitar as a leopard-patterned appendage smacks down against the river face and a pair of accustory green eyes fixate them. A long-nailed finger jabs towards them. “I _knew_ you were seeing someone!”

“Minho for deepsea's sake leave him alone!” Seungmin breaks the surface of the river and grabs onto the siren's body jewellery, tugging him back and away from the riverbank.

“You say that like you weren't curious too, Min,” Jisung huffs, finally popping out of the water as well and slicking his dark blue locks out of his face.

“What are you guys doing here?!”

All five heads turn as Felix pops indignantly out from behind the bush, jabbing a finger at the sirens, a few leaves and twigs tangled in his clothes and a pair of shades perched in his hair. And for some reason he was wearing a trench coat.

“You just busted us!”

And for some reason, Hyunjin pops out as well with the exact same garb, but his shades were perched in a rather lopsided and unflattering fashion on his nose and a twig was quite obviously tangled in his hair.

“I told you this was a bad idea,” Jeongin sighs, straightening up as well and brushing the foliage off of his clothes before reaching out to tug the twig ruthlessly out of Hyunjin’s hair, taking with it a few dark strands. Ignoring the taller man’s cry of complaint, he glances down and tugs Changbin up as well. “You'll get leg cramps if you stay down there like that, hyung, you're already short enough as it is.”

“Hey!”

Silence falls on the area as the situation sinks in, and Chan looks from the river to the bushes, his brow furrowing and his face turning crimson as he realizes that they must have witnessed everything. “...were you guys following us?”

“Of course we weren’t—” Jisung’s next words are muffled entirely as Seungmin claps a hand over his mouth, looking very unamused.

“Yes, yes they were,” he responds dryly.

“I second that,” Jeongin chimes in, jerking a thumb at Felix and Hyunjin. The pair gawp at him as though he had just taken the last piece of pizza from under their noses.

Woojin looks from one to the other and raises an eyebrow. He stands up and steps over to the riverside, his middle finger curling to rest beneath his thumb. Jisung’s eyes widen and he ducks away from Seungmin’s hand, darting away. “We’re sorry!” he screeches. “I don’t want to dieeee!”

“Calm down, Woojinnie,” Minho placates, holding his hands up and laughing nervously. “We were just worried since you’d always go off—”

“...Jisung literally admitted that the reason why you all followed him was because you were curious as to what he was doing,” Seungmin drawls.

“You followed too! Besides, no one bothers to cultivate indicolite anymore unless it’s for something really important or they really want something, you can’t blame me for thinking something was up! And it turns out, my gaydar has yet to fail me because I was right about him finding a significant other,” Minho huffs, crossing his arms over his chest.

Woojin emerges in front of him and flicks him in the forehead eliciting a yell of pain as he tenses at the unexpected attack and sinks beneath the current of the river.

“He got Minho!” Jisung wails from his distance and swims back to them, lifting Minho out of the water and looking down with distress into his unfocussed, green eyes. “Baby, don’t leave me, hold on!”

Seungmin just watches the pair’s dramatics with a raised eyebrow. “Oh, yes, while they were discussing a potential partner, Jisung mentioned it being about time since, I quote, ‘he’s getting old’,” he informs, his voice bordering on mischievous spite.

With another flick and another wail, Jisung falls.

Chan blinks owlishly at the scene before glancing back at the group that stood, still behind the bushes, staring wide-eyed at the transpiration of events. He quietly sets down his guitar and lifts himself to his feet. “As for you…”

“It was his idea!” Felix and Hyunjin exclaim simultaneously, pointing accusatory fingers at each other.

The curly-haired blonde looks from one to the other and then sighs. “You know, if you had anything to ask, you could have just asked,” he points out.

“Well we _tried_ , Chris,” Felix huffs. “But you weren’t answering any of them.”

“Well then.” The pair tense and collectively step away as Woojin slips out of the water, his tail bisecting and merging into a pair of legs wrapped in the silverish sharkskin. Woojin offers them a pleasant smile. “Ask away and we'll answer you.”

Hyunjin stares distrustfully at Woojin's hand and the siren just holds it up disarmingly. “Chan hasn't been saying anything because we agreed to keep it hidden, but I suppose there's no point in it now.”

“...since when, how, why and is Chan hyung happy?” Changbin is the one to break in with the questions before either Felix or Hyunjin can make fools of themselves yet again.

“And why didn't you tell us?!” Minho calls loudly from a little ways offshore, having recovered from the dreaded flick and still feeling rather indignant that it had been concealed to his knowledge.

Woojin sets a hand on Chan's shoulder and sits him down on the grass again before settling down beside him. “We've agreed to consider ourselves dating for a few months now,” he informs and after a moment of gathering himself and mentally convincing himself that he had no reason to be embarrassed, Chan nods.

“He approached me first actually,” Chan continues slowly. “We just started talking regularly and when we left Australia he told me that I had caught his interest and he wanted to court me.”

“Wooj, I know you're old and all, but that is _not_ how you flirt with someone,” Jisung groans, his head popping out of the water.

“It was sweet,” Chan defends before the golden-eyed siren has the chance to speak his retort. Woojin glances back at him with something akin to surprise in his eyes, but if it goes noticed, the blonde gives no sign. “I admitted that I didn't really feel much for him— I'm pretty sure I still had a grudge on him after the whole Hyunjin incident, but I agreed to let him 'court me’.”

Jeongin's eyes sparkle and he sits down on the grass with newfound interest. “And then what?”

Chan chuckles. “And then he started courting me. Sometimes when I couldn't sleep during the night, I'd hear him singing. I still don't understand how I could since we're literally on separate continents, but I have a feeling that it was something similar to when he would sing for me in Australia. But this time there wasn't drowning involved.” He glances over at Woojin who seems somewhat flustered by his words and his eyes crinkle in a smile. “I was surprised to see him just a little over a week after arriving back in Korea. He came to visit me and brought a gift.”

“Indicolite? Minho hums, resting his elbows on the grassy bank, his tail flicking about in the water.

“No. It was a cat's eye stone.” Chan spares Woojin another glance. “It looked nearly the same as his eyes.”

“...this is stupidly sappy,” Jisung huffs only to have the leopard-tailed siren elbow him in the ribs. He groans and hugs himself protectively. “What was that for?!”

“I'm sorry you don't have a romantic bone in your body,” Minho bites back.

“I’ll have you know I’m plenty romantic! And I definitely have a bone—” Seungmin slaps a hand over his mouth and dunks him under the water before he can finish his sentence.

Ignoring him, Minho turns to face the pair again. “So he bought you over?” He teases and Chan is quick to shake his head his ears reddening.

“No! That's—”

“Archaic? Washed out? Indecent?” Minho croons, his eyes glinting as though he were one of those gossipy aunts at a family reunion.

“How about you shut up and stop terrorizing the poor man?” Seungmin suggests, slapping the siren sharply between the skin of his shoulder blades and causing him to yelp sharply. He glances back at Chan, looking slightly apologetic.

“Can you stop terrorizing my lover?” Jisung suggests suddenly popping up beside Minho to rub his back where a reddish handprint was beginning to form. Seungmin has the decency to look slightly guilty since Jisung did look genuinely worried, but Minho glances back to offer the blue-eyed siren a reassuring smile and Seungmin figures they'll be fine.

“Can you please shut up?” Jeongin calls from where he's virtually twitching with impatience in front of Chan and Woojin. “I want to hear how the parents got together!”

“Did he just—” Changbin mutters.

“I think he just did—” Felix concurs. The pair exchange a look.

“We're doomed.”

“...I mean it makes sense,” Jisung muses.

“For once I agree with you,” Hyunjin agrees.

“I think we're having a bonding moment,” Jisung realizes, meeting Hyunjin's eyes. In a split second he's pushed into the water once again by Seungmin who only crosses his arms silently, looking inexplicably sullen.

“The fact is,” Woojin suddenly breaks in, “we have been seeing each other for a while now and I hope that Chan is happy because I know that he makes me happy.” He turns to meet Chan's eyes and the man rolls them fondly.

“So cheesy, Woojin,” he hums.

“I really don't think you have any right to say that considering some of the lyrics I've seen you scribble out and throw in the wastebin,” Changbin informs with a cocked eyebrow. The blonde flushes crimson at that and whips around to stare at Changbin.

“You looked at those? I trusted you!”

“Hyung, you should never trust someone that dates Lix,” Hyunjin declares solemnly, hand on his heart and all. In a matter of seconds, he's jumped by the two, nearly bent double in a chokehold and tickled and he screams bloody murder.

Chan looks around the park and silently thanks whatever deity is out there that it was virtually empty on their end. He sighs and glances back at Woojin, a lax smile on his face. “Sorry about them,” he apologizes.

“I could say the same on the behalf of mine too,” Woojin remarks, glancing back at the bank where Minho and Jisung were collectively laughing at Hyunjin being double-teamed by the couple while Seungmin watches on with an odd mixture of embarrassment and fondness in his eyes.

“Parents,” Jeongin declares shamelessly, his eyes sparkling as he claps his hands excitedly, and everyone knew that no one could resist Jeongin, especially not with the sparkling fox-eyes and bright, dimpled smile. So Chan just ruffles the youngest's hair resignedly and nods.

“I guess so.”

Jeongin gives a little cheer at that that’s both terribly cute and slightly awkward, and Woojin just looks completely taken by it, his lips pulled back into a sharp-toothed smile and a warm look in his eyes. Chan glances back at him and relaxes at the sight. “Maybe you were right,” he murmurs, reaching out to rest a hand on top of Woojin’s. “Maybe this will work out.”

“Awww~”

Chan tenses slightly and his lips purse as he hears Minho’s cooing. He turns to look at the others. “...you have all your answers,” he tells them. “Now can you let us have our date in peace?”

“Yep!” Hyunjin is the first to hop up and out of Felix and Changbin’s grip, hurrying over to the riverbank and picking Seungmin out of the water without a second thought, eliciting a yell of surprise from the brunette. “I’m gonna go be sappy with my boyfriend now because you betrayed me and hung out with yours all the time while I had to suffer being away from mine, I’ll forgive you if you buy me food, hyung.” He sets Seungmin down on the grass and removes his trench coat, throwing it over the brunette’s naked frame to shield him from view before grabbing his hand and darting off.

“...were the dramatics necessary?” Seungmin asks as soon as they’re out of both eyeshot and earshot of the others, but still walking upstream along the riverbank.

Pausing, Hyunjin turns to take both of Seungmin’s hands in his own, twining their fingers together comfortably with a crinkle-eyed smile. “Yeah, I’m dumb and dramatic but I missed you,” he admits without a lick of hesitation. “I haven’t seen you in months and you don’t even have a phone or a laptop.”

“We both agreed that would be an inconvenient and stupid idea, Hyunjin,” Seungmin reminds him.

“Yeah, yeah...electricity and water don’t mix,” he sighs, looking down at their interlaced fingers with a pout on his lips. “But I just...Minnie, I miss being able to see you and talk to you and hug you. I was really surprised to see you earlier but I’m happy you followed them.”

“I guess I owe those idiots one,” Seungmin sighs lightheartedly and Hyunjin giggles.

“And I guess stalking Chan hyung was a good idea.”

“Is that what the coat and sunglasses were for?”

Hyunjin nods, his features perfectly serious. “We needed disguises so that he wouldn’t notice us.”

Seungmin rolls his eyes, but can’t quite stop the smile that creeps onto his lips. “Well he certainly didn’t seem to notice you, but I don’t think it was because of your clothes,” he remarks dryly.

“Hey, my disguise skills are second to none.”

“Sure.” Seungmin releases Hyunjin’s hands and instead reaches up to cup his cheeks, the pads of his thumbs brushing over the delicate skin. He leans their foreheads together and Hyunjin feels his ears warm. Seungmin chuckles. “Now make up for all those months and kiss me.”

Hyunjin gladly obliges, leaning in to capture Seungmin’s cold lips with his own, his eyes lidding over. He rests an arm at the small of Seungmin’s back, tugging him closer. Seungmin tastes of the ocean: of salt and a refreshing sweetness and dark secrets and hidden life and _freedom_ , and Hyunjin doesn’t for a moment regret his decision in giving Seungmin back to the sea where he belonged.

It was of Hyunjin’s opinion that it wasn’t fair to tear the brunette away from his home, his habitat, and force him into a human skin where he certainly could not be comfortable. It wasn’t fair to his second family, to Woojin, Minho or Jisung if he was the sole reason Seungmin left. Hyunjin couldn’t take away his identity. Seungmin was human, of course, but Seungmin wasn’t _a_ human. Seungmin was a siren, he belonged in the waters, unconstrained by societal pressures and the unwritten laws that bound a human. And Hyunjin couldn’t be cruel enough to subject him to that. Seungmin had agreed with the reason of having to pull his share of work with the sirens for the sake of their home and habitat.

So he gave Seungmin back to the sea and left with him his heart, trusting that both would return to him someday.

Seungmin is the first to move away from the kiss in favour of letting his arms snake up Hyunjin's shoulder blades. His features almost glow with the happiness in his smile as he meets Hyunjin's eyes. “I've missed you, love.”

“I've missed you too, Minnie,” Hyunjin giggles, pecking his forehead. “Will you be staying for a bit or do you need to go soon?” He pauses. “...how long did it even take you to get here? You swam the whole way, right? That's a long swim—”

Seungmin silences his rambling with a finger to his lips and chuckles. “It only took about a day with a good pace and a bit of magic. You learn to swim fast when you have to keep up with those fish…” he glances downriver, his eyes glinting silver. “And I think that the sea can survive without us for a little bit.” He smiles. “If Woojin agrees to let us stay awhile, then we'll be here for a bit longer.”

Hyunjin kisses Seungmin's finger and blood rushes to the brunette's ears as he lowers his hand almost immediately. Hyunjin grins slightly. “If he says no then just bring up Chan hyung,” he suggests.

“I can't say I'm surprised about that,” Seungmin muses shifting away from Hyunjin to pad along the bank. Hyunjin naturally follows.

“Is this about the time when you saw Chan hyung with Woojin?”

Seungmin glances back at him. “How do you know about that?”

“Binnie hyung mentioned it in passing,” Hyunjin dismisses.

The brunette nods. “Yes. He didn't bother to hide his fascination with Chan either. He described him as someone with a character like music.” Seungmin smiles slightly. “I don't think I fully understand what that means, but seeing them interact makes me realize it a little more. I'm glad Woojin found someone.”

“Same goes with Chan hyung,” Hyunjin hums. “He’s just had really bad luck with relationships in general. He’s too kind—too many people take advantage of that.” Hyunjin frowns. “I know Woojin’s a good guy and all, but I’m honestly a bit wary of him being with Chan hyung because I don’t want Chan hyung to suffer again.”

Seungmin shakes his head. “Although we’ve encountered other siren clans before by trans-oceanic travelling, Woojin’s never been interested in anyone. And I’ve known him all my life. If there’s anything I know about sirens, it’s that they’re incredibly loyal. Minho and Jisung have been together for nearly seventy years now.”

Hyunjin’s eyes bug out for a moment before he laughs ruefully. “That’s right, they’re old. That’s so weird.”

“You get used to it after a while,” Seungmin dismisses. His gaze shifts back to Hyunjin and he reaches up to touch Hyunjin's neck, his fingertips brushing over the relatively smooth skin. “What's this?” He asks curiously.

Hyunjin grins slightly. “Makeup can do wonders, can't it?” He huffs. “I honestly don't like having to hide it every day since it's stuffy, but what to do.” He touches his neck. “If I'm feeling lazy I'll just wear turtlenecks but I can't do that well if the weather is so hot.”

Seungmin nods, intrigued, and prods at his neck causing him to squirm away. “Minnie— that tickles!”

Seungmin smiles at that and just leans forward to press a soft kiss over the makeup-hidden gills. “Sorry, love.” He glances up at Hyunjin's face to see that his cheeks have stained a lovely shade of pink. The brunette laughs softly and leans in to peck his lips before resting his head against Hyunjin's shoulder. “You're so warm…”

“Warm, hm?” Hyunjin echoes, and he feels a slight reprieve from Seungmin's cool skin as the brunette flushes slightly. He glances over and laughs softly. “Warmer around you,” he hums. “Nothing makes me warmer than having you here.”

“You're so cheesy,” Seungmin complains, but there's a smile pressed onto his lips.

“Well then I guess I should be glad you're not lactose-intolerant,” Hyunjin chirps back. He glances downriver. “I'm going to go check on the guys before heading out,” he announces. “I need to get you into a more comfortable set of clothes so I can really take you on a date.”

Seungmin seems rather caught off guard by that, and a shadow creeps into his gaze, but he nods slowly. “Yes, of course…” Hyunjin smiles at him and turns back, padding downriver, and after a moment of hesitation, Seungmin follows him, his hands gripping the lapels of the trench coat that Hyunjin had slipped onto his frame.

The pair fall comfortably into step beside each other, their shoulders nearly brushing with their proximity, and Seungmin pauses every now and then to steal a glance at his surroundings to check for any other humans that may be present. His discomfort is soon picked up by Hyunjin who takes his hand and squeezes it comfortingly. His shoulders relax slightly, but the natural wariness doesn't go away.

Hyunjin suddenly stops short and Seungmin almost bumps into him, catching himself at the last moment. He glances over at the taller man only to see Hyunjin's eyes zoning into the distance. He follows his gaze to a park bench wherein Felix and Changbin were seated with Minho and Jisung sat down on the grass, the two sirens sporting pairs of legs.

 

“Here you go.” Jisung removes one of his chains that's draped around his wrist with a few pearls strung with it and presses it into Felix's hand. “That's an apology.”

The blonde just looks confused at that and stares down at the bracelet. “For what?”

“For nearly drowning you back then,” Minho responds, seeming genuinely remorseful. “We never properly apologized.”

“Hey, guys, it's fine,” Felix insists, holding the bracelet back out to Jisung. “I know it wasn't really you guys. And I'm here now and I'm fine. You don't need to apologize.”

Changbin shakes his head. “That's not true, Lix, you've been unable to step into open bodies of water since getting back from Australia. You only swim in pools now.” At that, the blonde looks down, not meeting their eyes.

The two sirens exchange a look and Jisung pushes Felix's hand away. “Take it,” he insists. “It's a charm. It'll protect you in the water.” He offers Felix a wry grin. “We meant to give it to you before you left, but…" He drifts off.

“But _some_ one,” Minho less-than-subtly casts a side-glance at Jisung, “forgot to charm it on time so we couldn't give it to you back then.”

“Hey, don't blame me! You should've done it yourself if I forgot!”

“Well if you didn't forget, then there would've been no need for that, now would there? You must be getting decrepit.”

“Decrepit yourself, you cat-faced blobfish!”

“Who are you calling a blobfish, you doddery sea cucumber?!”

 

Seungmin just sighs and turns away from the pair. Hyunjin swears he can hear the brunette's repeated mutters of _“I don't know them…”_ but he makes no comment on it. Instead he turns his attention to where Chan, Woojin and Jeongin are still seated beneath the willow tree, closer to the riverside.

 

“—and that's why you have to tell us things, hyung, we worry about you too much,” Jeongin scolds although in reality it's more cute than anything else since he's pouting and his arms are crossed over his chest.

“I know, I'm sorry, Innie, but sometimes you just have to wait for the right time.”

“Maybe Hyunjin hyung and Felix hyung wouldn't have dragged me along on their stalking spree if you had just mentioned it earlier,” the maknae huffs. “I was one minute away from breaking their kneecaps, hyung. One minute!”

Chan reaches out to ruffle Jeongin's hair. “Well then let's be grateful that the truth was out before one minute was up,” he responds and Woojin chuckles at that.

“I’ll keep that in mind. But I know that you probably followed them because you were worried about Chan, right?” His golden eyes glint mirthfully. “I'm sure that they would've let you go on your way if you really wanted to.”

Jeongin's ears redden slightly and he averts his eyes. “Maybe,” he admits after a moment. He pauses and then looks up at Woojin with serious eyes. “Chan hyung takes care of us. He doesn't have to and he shouldn't have to because we're all grown up, but he does because that's just who he is. But he's also incredibly stupid since he thinks he can handle everything on his own. We don't know what he's going through a lot of the time.”

Jeongin rests his hands in his lap. “So of course we were worried. We want good things for him.”

Woojin's gaze softens and he turns to meet Chan's surprised eyes and slightly pink face. “As do I, Jeongin,” he concurs, his voice soft.

The youngest looks from one to the other in silence for a few moments before snickering and tugging his phone out of his pocket. “...then you two should kiss.”

 

Hyunjin decides that now would be a good time to look away. He glances back at Seungmin and chuckles. “I guess everyone's fine. So we can head off now. Where do you think you want to go on a date? It'll be on me.”

The brunette's lips purse and he shakes his head. “...there are so many humans,” he murmurs. “It's a bit much. Could we just go somewhere quiet? Just the two of us..?” His ears warm at his own words and Hyunjin coos softly at the endearing sight.

He giggles and tilts his head. “Why don't we get you home then, so I can cuddle you properly?” He suggests, his eyes sparkling.

The brunette cocks a judgemental eyebrow at him, but there's a fond glint in his dark eyes. “Home, huh?” Seungmin chuckles and takes Hyunjin's hand, lacing their fingers together. “Home sounds nice.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, for the people that read end notes, I hope you enjoyed it!  
> I've loved this journey with all you wonderful readers and I hope to write more soon  
> Also, I forgot to mention it before, but the reason why I made an account and started writing was because of all the people here that wrote such wonderful fanfics *^* you guys all inspired me  
> Many of you that have read this are actually people whose stories I have read and that I love, and it means a lot to me that you've read my work too and enjoyed it <3 Thank you so much for your support  
> And for all the other wonderful readers, I loved having this journey with you and seeing your comments and support that really brightened up my day. Thank you all !  
> I'll see you again whenever I'm able to write something more, so until then <3


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